In the Name of the Living God: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.
How many times as child on a family road trip did you chime in from the backseat, asking, “Are we there yet?”
My parents said I was good for that question about every ten miles or so. I think it drove them nuts. Apparently, the disciples were no different. They had their own version of the question. Frequently, they asked Jesus, “Lord, is this the time when you will restore the kingdom to Israel?”
I think everyone should, especially dads on summer road trips with kids, should have a little Scripture memorized. When your children ask for the 60th time, “Are we there yet,” just explain it like Jesus did: “It is not for you to know the times or periods that [your] Father has set by his own authority.”
When I look back over this journey we’ve been on as a parish, as a nation, as a planet for the last few months, I can’t help but ask the same question: Lord, are we there yet? Are we out of the woods yet? As each day passes, it seems that I’m left with more questions than answers.
On the lighter – maybe even darker side of comedy – some of the best memes I’ve seen thru all this have been “2020: A Movie by Stephen King and Directed by Quentin Tarantino” and “2020: I’ve had my three month trial, and I’d like my money back, please.”
Speaking more frankly with you, this has been a hard season for all of us, and to say anything less is a lie or blatant denial. Many of us have suffered distress like never before: Physical and mental illness, many facing financial ruin, fear at an all-time high, and so on.
There is also a common spiritual illness – a malady of the soul – that has been increasing throughout all of this, and that’s what I want to briefly talk about this morning.
The symptoms go like this: how many times over the last couple of months have you found yourself, either literally or figuratively, looking up and asking something like this, “God, where are you?” Have you forgotten us? Do you care?”
Have you shaken your fist at Almighty God over the last two months? I’m too embarrassed to tell you how many times I have.
The spiritual flu – we’ll just call it spiritual COVID – starts with a small, nagging feeling that God is missing – that He’s terribly distant…that he’s asleep at the wheel. And it goes downhill from there.
Loretta Lynn (yeah, LO-retta!) did a great job singing about that gut-wrenching moment in a relationship when “the tingle becomes a chill” – when what used to feel like a two-way relationship, well, starts to feel like one ember of the duo is no longer really feelin’ it.
Do you remember when Job was totally channeling Loretta Lynn? At one point, Job said:
“Today my complaint is bitter;
my hand is heavy on account of my groaning.
Oh, that I knew where I might find God,
that I might come even to his seat!
Job’s not talking about taking God a box of chocolates and a love note. I swear Job is like the Liam Neeson of the Bible (don’t you remember the movies Taken One, Taken Two, Taken Three and so on? What more could be taken from the poor man?). Anyway, I’m talking about our prayerful frustration. Move over Hail Mary and the Our Father: many of us are praying from The Righteous Brothers right now:
Bring back that lovin’ feelin’
‘Cause it’s gone, gone, gone!
Of course, it’s not gone, it just can feel that way when you have spiritual COVID.
St. Luke tells us that immediately After the Ascension, the same sort of symptoms I’m talking about this morning instantly surfaced in the disciples. In fact, two men appeared to the disciples, wearing white robes, and said: “Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking up toward heaven.”
But the two who appeared weren’t lookin’ for answers. They were coming with commentary, because what they asked is the most rhetorical question recorded in all of the bible. “Why do you stand looking up toward heaven?” is to say, “Do you really think the now ascended and exalted Christ can no longer be part of your story? Do you really think it’s over? Are you going to just going to stand there and stare forever?”
And the most revealing – and, ironically, the most comforting part of their commentary – comes at the very beginning, when these messengers – perhaps angels – began by addressing them as “Men of Galilee.”
Calling them “men of Galilee” isn’t a put down for being country bumpkins, previous tax collectors and wild men. It’s the audible reminder that Love Incarnate – Jesus Himself – didn’t require a pedigree, a good performance, or the right zip code to be in a relationship with Him – that He hunted them down precisely as they were, not as they wished to be.
The greatest tragedy on earth – far worse than COVID – is that many people believe getting all polished up, having some accomplishment in the rear view mirror, and showing some upward mobility, in terms of spirituality and morality, are the prerequisites to having a relationship with God. That is tragedy writ large.
God chooses to be in a relationship with you – chooses to be in a relationship with me – wherever we are – no matter the failures, setbacks and disappointments. And the good news of the gospel is that nothing we can do will ever change that – no action, no pandemic, not even death itself can “separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord” Romans 8:39).
So, where is God in all of this?
There comes a time in every person’s life when everything seems to work against us, when we find ourselves bruised and beaten by things entirely beyond our control. And this produces suffering. And unchecked suffering can lead to spiritual decay.
Teilhard de Chardin, the rather controversial twentieth century scientist-theologian, who was a stretcher-bearer in the French Army during World War I, said that no matter our circumstances (no matter the suffering!) in the end: “We have only two choices: adoration or annihilation.”
Gazing up into heaven, as frightened, confused, and angry disciples, isn’t really a path forward. The saintly archbishop of Canterbury, Michael Ramsey wrote:
There is the existence of pain and tragedy in nature and in the world, and Christians recognize the Passion of Christ. They do not fear the struggle, for pain has been used by Christ and has been given a new significance. Taught by Him, Christians can use it [all] for love, for sympathy and for intercession. It also makes them members of one another in a unity springing from the Cross and pointing to the glory to be revealed.
Yes, that’s what we can do – what we must do – sisters and brothers – not gazing up in despair but allowing our pain and suffering to be transformed into something that points the whole world to glory of Almighty God.
Then I think we’ll be in a better place spiritually. We’ll begin to have that coveted mindset of St. Paul when he said, “we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall understand fully, even as I have been fully understood.”
Choose adoration.
Sermon preached by the Rev. Charleston D. Wilson
Church of the Redeemer
Sarasota Florida
7th Sunday of Easter
24 May 2020