The Rev. Charleston Wilson
In the Name of the Living God: Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Amen.
Most people – maybe all people – are looking for that great escape, trying to find that experience of a lifetime that promises to be “one of a kind” or “out of this world.” Of course, since this is Lent, perhaps I should be a bit more blunt, and diagnose the situation as that great country hit describes it: “we’re lookin’ for love in all the wrong places.”Yet, even if we’re looking in all the wrong places this Lent, the fact that we’re always looking is foundational to what I’d like to say in this little homily.
Yes, we’re always looking for a way to get away from it all, seeking something beyond our normal, daily routines. At a very basic level, this is part of what it means to be a human being with the gift of free will. The gift isn’t the problem; we just tend to overdo it.
And who can forget “Thelma and Louise,” that insightful – yet tragic – 90s film with Susan Sarandon and Geena Davis? Thelma captures this urge we all have perfectly. Do you remember when she boldly tells Louise, “You said you ‘n’ me was gonna get out of town and for once just really let our hair down. Well darlin’, look out ’cause my hair is comin’ down!?”
Do you ever feel the same way?
It makes perfect sense to me. Of course, it doesn’t help that I have always loved to travel, and, apparently, all the advertisers know this, because I get all the good travel magazines – Conde Nast, Travel and Leisure, National Geographic, etc. You name it and chances are I get it. Hardly a day goes by without one them arriving in the post. And they all have these amazing, tantalizing photographs of these “out of this world” vacation snapshots. The sun is always shining, the water is always clear and calm, and the food looks delicious. And calories – well, apparently, calories don’t exist on vacation. Eat and drink all you want because, from my own experience, I have found that calories wait until we return home before they go in the closest while we’re sleeping and take in the waist of our trousers.
May I ask you – if you wouldn’t be too scandalized – what exactly you dream of escaping and doing differently? Is there something you want to do differently in your daily life?
If we’re truly looking for the escape of a lifetime – we might say the escape of three lifetimes – we need to look no further than the eighth chapter of St. Mark’s Gospel, which was just proclaimed in our midst. Our Lord Jesus Christ says, “For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake, and for the sake of the gospel, will save it.”
Yes, if you want your Lent – if I want my Lent – to be about something more meaningful than handing over the chocolate and vodka, we must seriously consider the great escape that is being offered in our Saviour’s words. You see, if we truly want to take the plunge and finally put to rest that restless impulse we all have – that inner Thelma, if you will – our Lord says we must face the fact that we must lose our lives in order to save our lives. Then and only then will we experience something one of a kind, something truly out of this world.
It’s not so much that He’s asking us to lose our day-jobs and become missionaries to Nepal (although He might very well do that!). No, no. He’s asking us to lose something much, much more precious. He’s inviting us on a journey to lose self-sufficiency and self-reliance – to jettison our need to be independent – and to quit pretending that’ we’re in control of everything around us – so that we can get in touch with our need to be dependent – dependent on Him for forgiveness, love and grace.
I’m talking about finally handing it all over to God – and I mean all of it – warts and all, as they say.
You see, God doesn’t want your fullness this Lent. He wants our emptiness so that He may fill it with His fullness. He doesn’t want our good works, of which we may be tempted to boast. He wants our bad works so that He may wash them away.
Then, and only then, do the blind begin to see, the deaf begin to hear and the lame begin to walk. Darkness then turns to light, and even death – well, death turns into new life.
Our friend, Bishop Michael Marshall, told me that he was once leading a Lenten retreat in London many years ago, and he was speaking metaphorically of our need to unclench our hands and open the doors of our hearts so that God could enter in. And he kept making this gesture – you know, opening his hands. Well, as the retreat ended and the time came for everyone to come up to receive the Blessed Sacrament at the altar rail this one elderly lady came up with her fists visibly clinched. Bp. Michael noticed her, and he thought it was an act of defiance. She had, earlier in the retreat, given Bp. Michael a hard time about some of his thoughts. So when she knelt, he said he couldn’t resist; he looked her in the eye and said, “Didn’t you hear me? We must open up our hearts and our hands to be healed. In the name of Jesus Christ, open your hands.” She at once opened her hands and began to weep. What he didn’t know until after the mass was that she was born with a rare arthritis that had prevented her from ever opening her hands. In that instant, God healed her and she was able for the first time to open up her hands. And how beautiful that the first time she used her hands was to receive the Body and Blood of her Saviour!
And so it must be for you and for me. We must unclench our hands and our heads and our hearts this Lent. We must be willing to open up – to lose control in order that He may take control and give us the wholeness and healing for which we all yearn.
St. Augustine always gets it right. Indeed, as he says, “our hearts are ever restless until they rest in Thee, O God.”
Sermon preached by the Rev. Charleston D. Wilson
The Church of the Redeemer
Sarasota Florida
2nd Sunday of Lent
1 March 2015