LIVING OUR PROMISES - PART II
INSTALLING A PEACEMAKER

Micah 6:6-8
Matthew 5:1-10

St. Andrew's-Wesley United Church

Rev. Gary Paterson

November 9, 2008

Well, it’s the second Sunday of our Stewardship Campaign, “Living Our Promises.” It was well and truly launched last Sunday, recognizing that at its heart, this campaign is really about inviting each of us to be part of the ongoing story of the Christ, to participate in this holy vision, taking our place in a vast communion of saints. Visits are happening; conversations continuing; commitments being made. So what do you say on the second Sunday? – Because, just to forewarn you, I promised the Stewardship Campaign Committee that I would preach about Stewardship for the month of November. So as I said, what happens in the second sermon? And not just have it be the same old, same old.

Then, when we looked more carefully at the dates, the Committee realized that today was also Remembrance Day Sunday. This is the Sunday that we remember the cost of war. We remember soldiers fallen in battle – the one hundred and sixteen thousand Canadian soldiers who died in the two great wars. We remember families grieving; veterans who are still with us, carrying the violence of war in their bodies and hearts; civilians, women, men and children, caught up in the killing. We remember with sadness; we offer respect; we acknowledge our gratitude, especially for those who gave their lives. Somehow it almost seemed crass to talk about Stewardship.

But you know, I have been thinking about this for a while now, and strangely enough, I have come to recognize that there really are deep connections between the two – between Remembrance Day and Stewardship. Perhaps most directly, we are giving thanks for the women and men who were willing to offer their lives, presenting their most precious gift for the well-being of others; we are remembering their total generosity of spirit; they were good stewards of their lives.

But the connection goes further, because, at its best, stewardship is call to re-examine our lives, a chance to think about what we are doing for the world with our talents, time and resources. What are we willing to die for; what are we willing to live for? Stewardship is all about giving -- how are we saying thank you? How are we using our gifts? A stewardship campaign ultimately has to turn the face of the church to the world. For it is the world where we make real the gospel. Remember that famous verse in John’s Gospel: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him, shall not die, but have everlasting life.” (Jn. 3:16) Note, it is the world that God loves; not just you and me; not just the Church – God loves the whole blinkin’ world. And asks us to do the same.

When you get the Stewardship Campaign Booklet, coming to your home soon when you meet with your Visitors, take a look at the promises which this campaign revolves. You’ll probably recognize them right away as the four promises that parents make when having their children baptized; the promises made by all of us when we chose to become members here at St. Andrew’s-Wesley. You know these promises, but let me remind you of # 3:

Will you celebrate God’s presence,

Live with respect in Creation,

Love and serve others,

Seek justice and resist evil?

I will, God being my helper.

Which gets translated as the challenge to share with others, in the world, the significance of your encounter, connection and relationship with God; it is to recognize that our faith makes a difference in how we choose to live our lives; we are committing ourselves to the work of compassion, peace and justice. Oh, we’ll miss the mark frequently; and we’ll sure need a lot of help from God to keep that promise – but that’s what we hold ourselves to – a signpost, a challenge, a determination to let our lives be shaped by this commitment to love the world – our neighbours, strangers, even enemies; the whales and the songbirds; the rivers and the oceans.

And you can see some of that commitment when you look at our church budget – later, take a look at the insert in today’s bulletin, those pie-charts that show money coming in and going out. As a church community we actually are tithing, giving eleven per cent of our income away. Some of that is for local outreach, for Lunches for Seniors; the Empty Suitcase, support for women running from abuse; food, clothing and money for First United in the Downtown Eastside. Some goes beyond our borders, to Free the Children, under Russell’s guidance; or to help bring clean water to villagers in Guatemala. And some goes to the Mission and Service Fund of the United Church – which means that our dollars go walking across the country, supporting work with First Nations, in inner cities; or around the globe, for emergency relief, for long term development and projects for change.

Recently some of those Mission and Service funds have been used to help launch a new project, “United for Peace” – a decision on the part of our church to work more intentionally for peace, directing support to groups that at the ground level are working to bring about more understanding, change… yes, hopefully, to bring peace a bit closer. You can learn more about “United for Peace” by picking up the cherry pink handout in the Church entrance. There is probably no better way to honour the dead than to recommit ourselves to peace-making. I have often thought that those lines in McCrae’s poem “In Flander’s Fields” – “Take up our quarrel with the foe” – are not simply a reference to enemy forces, but rather “the foe” is ourselves, is humanity – whatever it is within us that brings us so quickly to violence, to attack, fight, to kill. That’s the real foe. United for Peace… not a bad name for such a programme.

Now, let’s shift gears slightly, and let me come at this from a different angle, to root it in the Biblical story that we are part of. I want to hold up those well-known verses from Micah, the ones we sing at the end of the service every Sunday as we go walking out from worship, into the world. Micah was speaking, I suspect, to people much like us -- people involved in the life of a worshiping community, wondering what they should be doing to please God, to be in harmony with the Spirit. Micah does a fast summary, so simple and direct:

God has told you, O mortal, what is good;

and what does the LORD require of you

but to do justice,

and to love kindness

and to walk humbly with your God?

Active verbs… get out there and act justly; do the right thing; love not as feeling, but as a making choices that put flesh on loving intentions; deeds of kindness; all undertaken with a deep humility, and with connection to the Holy One.

A couple of weeks ago I was talking to a friend who is possibly facing his death in the not too distant future. We had gotten together to plan his Memorial Service – not an easy thing to do. My friend has asked that these verses from Micah be at the centre of his Service. He said, “All my life these words… do justice, love kindness, walk humbly with God – they have been a touchstone for me; I’ve tried to live a life that was always guided by these verses; it’s what I’ve been about with my family, my friends, and with my work. They framed what I tried to do; they gave a focus; guidelines, hope.” My friend gave me permission to share this with you. Not a bad way to shape one’s life, is it?

I wanted to hold these verses from Micah side by side with some words from Jesus… the Beatitudes. In a way, I wonder if Jesus actually had something like this – “do justice, love kindness, walk humbly with God” -- at the back of his mind as he spoke. Because the beatitudes almost sound like Jesus doing a improv on the basic theme, offering some specifics that spell out the implications of what Micah was driving at; the beatitudes as a different and expanded way of saying the same thing. Be gentle; be rich in mercy; hunger and thirst after righteousness; commit to being a peacemaker… not just a peacelover, but “doing” the things that make for peace… in your family, in your neighbourhood and city, between nations.

But these are not just marching orders from Jesus, another command to get busy. It’s the first word that changes how I hear what Jesus is saying… “Blessed”… that’s what he says we’ll be when we participate in the work of peace, justice and compassion. I don’t think he means you’ll cash in on a reward after you’re dead, with enough points to get you into heaven. No, I think he is saying that when we engage in the work, we’ll catch a glimpse of the deep rightness of what we are doing; we will recognize an underlying partnership with a Holy Force that is likewise seeking to tend and mend the world. Blessing comes in so many different ways, but I think of it as the feeling of rightness of being, of connectedness with what is good in the world, and my being a part of it; it is to be able, as my friend is, to look at the ending of your days and affirm that your life has been good; that it holds enough of justice, kindness and trust that it feels blessed.

I want to put more flesh on all these words, as we remember, as we hear the call to be stewards for peace and justice. I want to take you into the movie “Schindler’s List.” Spielberg’s telling of the story of Oscar Schindler, who saved over eleven hundred Jews from the gas ovens of Auschwitz. The film opens so simply, in the middle of Sabbath worship, a Jewish family gathered around the table. The candles are lit; they burn brightly, but slowly they burn down, and down and out… and as wisps of smoke rise in the darkening room, the colour fades from the film into a black and white movie, where smoke rises from the engines of efficiency and the chimneys of human incinerators. This is a film that explores the ever shifting balance of light and darkness in the human soul, and in the society, the community we have created all around us. Faces half-illuminated, the other half in shadow; shifting and changing. We are taken visually into the depths of Hell, when we are forced to watch the destruction of the ghetto of Crakow; and again, when the bodies of those fifty thousand Jews are exhumed and burned, in an attempt to hid the earlier slaughter.. This is human sin, perhaps at its worst.

Though there is terrifying competition for the label of “worst”. One hundred and eleven million people killed in the wars of the last century. I took a spin of the globe,.remembering the wars after World War II, the wars of the last sixty years. Nations against nation; or civil war, with people at each other’s throats as countries tear themselves apart. You might start with Northern Ireland, then shift to Serbia and Bosnia; drop south to Cyprus, then back up to Hungary and Czechoslovakia; go east to Chechnya and Georgia; south again to Lebanon, Israel, Palestine, Jordan, Egypt, Syria, Kuwait, Iraq, Iran… don’t stop… Afghanistan, Pakistan, India, China, Burma, Cambodia, Viet Nam, Sri Lanka, East Timor, Korea; than jump continents and remember Argentina and the Falkland Islands; think of the military Junta in Chile, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras; Shining Path in Peru; drug wars in Columbia; and God knows what is happening in Haiti. Then pause for a moment, and weep for Africa. For Sudan and Darfur, Central African Republic, Algeria, Sierra Leone, Liberia, Nigeria, and cross over to Ethiopia, Somalia and down to Rwanda, and include Mozambique, Angola… and then stop at the Congo… where genocide is happening in our times, right now.

“Schindler’s List” does not flinch from revealing our murderous souls. Amon Goeth, the commander of the Forced Labour Camp, becomes the embodiment of evil –“A decent man;” says Schindler defensively, “he likes to cook; he enjoys fine women, cognac…” “And killing,” interrupts his accountant and conscience, Yitzhak Stern. Goeth has slid from indulgence to debauchery to depravity; he kills for sport, and from compulsion. But we can’t pretend that evil always wears the face of a psychopath; there is something in all of us, that same mixture of light and dark. My friend, yes… same friend as before…, he told me a story about attending a presentation on the Holocaust, by a man whose family had been caught up in the killing. The speaker, this Jewish man, he told the story of fifty soldiers surrounding a synagogue on Sabbath; as the children, women and men were driven from their worship, out of their sanctuary and into the street, they were shot and killed. And then he asked this question: “How could this be? Perhaps a few crazy men; but surely at least forty-five were ordinary, decent men, not murderers? With families; who perhaps attended church; who, before the war, had regular every-day lives. What happens to make decent people lose their memory of being human?”

Oscar Schindler is not a particularly good man. He’s an indulgent hedonist, loving wine, cognac, women, pleasure, money… the good things in life. He has panache, he says; he establishes an impression. And he is willing to cut many many corners to get what he wants. Willling to use slave labour, for example, when the price is right. Don’t turn this guy into a saint. But as the story unfolds, as Schindler’s enamelware factory moves into high production, and the money flows into his pockets, he must also observe the murder, the inhumanity; something happens when you must scrape off human ashes from the windshield of your car before driving. Schindler finds himself in anguished, angry questioning: “What do you want me to do?” “What am I supposed to do?” It’s a slow-growing change; because decency? conscience? shared humanity? Who knows exactly. But when Schindler has the opportunity to save Jewish lives, he is confronted by Amon Goeth’s question: “What is a person worth to you?” It’s not a question you can forget; it’s not an easy question to live with. For any of us. “What’s a person worth to you?”

In a strange way, Oscar becomes a good steward, and with his suitcases of money, his treasure, he buys eleven hundred Jews, children, women and men; he saves them. At the end, when Oscar must flee for his life as the war unwinds, he breaks down, saying over and over, “I could have done more. I could have saved more.” But the voice of conscience, Yitzhak Stern, replies, “No. This list, these eleven hundred names. This is absolute good. This is life. All around, on the margins… the gulf”. Oscar is given a gold ring by those he has saved, inscribed with a verse from the Talmud, “He who saves one life, saves the world entire.”

What’s a person worth to me? How am I choosing to spend my money? How directed am I by the call to seek justice, love kindness and walk humbly with God? Could I be a better steward? I am not Oscar Schindler; that is not my call – thank God. Or maybe it might be; where ever it is I find myself. But probably more ordinary; a peacemaker in the every day happenings. So listen to this poem by Mary Oliver, called “Wage Peace”:

Wage peace with your breath.

Breathe in firemen and rubble,

breathe out whole buildings

and flocks of redwing blackbirds.

Breathe in terrorists and breathe out sleeping children

and freshly mown fields.

Breathe in confusion and breathe out maple trees.

Breathe in the fallen

and breathe out lifelong friendships intact.

Wage peace with your listening:

hearing sirens, pray loud.

Remember your tools:

flower sees, clothes pins, clean rivers.

Make soup.

Play music, learn the word for thank you in three languages.

Learn to knit, and make a hat.

Think of chaos as dancing raspberries,

imagine grief as the outbreath of beauty

or the gesture of fish.

Swim for the other side.

Wage peace.

Never has the world seemed so fresh and precious.

Have a cup of tea and rejoice.

Act as if armistice has already arrived.

Don’t wait another minute.

May it be so. Amen.