Sermon: Call to be Wheat .. or, 1001 Ways to Die
When Megan and I
were planning the liturgy for today and deciding who would do what, she was happy
and quick to design the bulletin cover and agree to light the candles. She was just as quick to say she didn’t want
to do anything that would involve speaking or reading in front of people. I don’t think she used these words, but it
was something akin to “I’d die if I had to do that – I’d die of embarrassment
or fear or something just as bad.”
So I didn’t ask
her to do anything like that. I didn’t
want her to die, until someone wiser than me in the ways of leadership
development and in the ways of her daughter said to me, “Just tell her what you
want her to do.” So I did. And she did it. And did well.
And we all benefitted from it.
Sometimes we have
to let ourselves die – whether of embarrassment, fear or anything else just as
bad, and let ourselves die to the fear of the dying, in order for new life to
emerge and for ourselves to have a part in.
On June 10, 1925
when 8000 people were gathered at Mutual Street Arena in Toronto for the worship
service to celebrate the newly inaugurated United Church of Canada, they heard
a sermon on our reading for today, and on the holy wisdom of dying for the sake
of allowing new life to emerge and grow.
The 8000 people were
members of what to that point had been Methodist, Presbyterian and Congregationalist
churches across Canada, and together they were letting go of their old and
separate identities to open a way for God’s work to flourish in new ways and
with new strength in their time. They
were finding a way into what they believed God was doing and wanted to be
doing, by being willing to die to what they were used to being. As Rev. S.P. Rose said in that inaugural
sermon, the challenge was to be willing to die in order to “enter into a larger
life,” because the grain of wheat that does not die will perish.
So the message
and practice of dying to allow new and good life to emerge, is part of who we
are right from our beginning. It’s been
spoken into our spiritual DNA.
But that still
doesn’t make it any easier to live out.
The challenge to die takes different forms at different times and in
different situations, and at times it can be very difficult.
In the context of
individual United churches, for some United Church members today it means accepting
the death of their congregation – either simply disbanding, or maybe
amalgamating or combining in another way with one or more other congregations
for the sake of new and more vital ministry and mission together. In situations like this, the grain of wheat
that does not die but tries to stay as it is, will perish. But the dying can still be hard.
In the context of
the United Church as a whole, this may be what the Comprehensive Review is all about. The proposal that’s been worked on for three
or four years and that’s going to General Council this summer is for a smaller,
leaner United Church with fewer levels of government and oversight, less paid
staff beyond the congregational level, and hopefully more resources to support those
individual congregations that really have a vision and passion for God’s new
work. Sometimes – and maybe it’s now, the
outer shell of our life as God’s people – as good as it’s been for us for 90 years,
now has to be cracked open and let go of, so the new life within can emerge and
really grow. And that can be hard.
In the context of
Canadian society and the United Church’s place in it, maybe the life-giving
dying we’re called to, is to let go of the feeling we had in 1925 of being especially
and uniquely called by God to be the guiding conscience of the emerging country
of Canada. That was one of the major
reasons for Church Union, and the United Church has always tried to live up
that call. Canada has no less need now than
it did then for a soul and a spiritual conscience, but maybe it’s time to die
to that feeling of our specialness or uniqueness in that call, to recognize that
there are other religious voices and traditions that now are equally part of
our country’s conscience and soul, and to die to any lingering feelings of
exclusiveness and superiority so we can work more intentionally and humbly as partners with others. As Rev. Rose challenged the
United Church in 1925, the grain of wheat that remains alone and unmixed with
others in the soil of its day, will shrivel and perish.
And speaking of
soil, and to return to Environment Sunday and our call to care for the goodness
of Earth that God has created, in that context how can we not see in the teaching
about the grain of wheat’s willingness to die for the sake of a greater
harvest, an encouragement to us as human beings – as individuals and as a
species, to die to some of our practices and attitudes, to give Earth and all
life on it a chance to live well and into the future.
Today more and
more doesn’t it seem that our choice is either to continue to grow as a noxious weed
on the face of the Earth – inserting ourselves into every nook and cranny of
Earth, taking over and dominating its life, or to learn to be good wheat and
wheat seeds – accepting along with others the necessity of dying to our own
desires, limiting who we are and what we do and maybe even where we go for the
sake of a good future for all of life.
It’s a dying to
self that happens in all kinds of ways – both little and big, both relatively
easy and very hard.
It can be as
simple and quick as a Girl Guide dedicating an afternoon to designing a
bulletin cover for her church’s worship service on Environment Sunday, instead
of watching TV or just relaxing … or as complex as a global network of
scientists, engineers, economists and politicians honestly working to design a
fossil-fuel-free economy and society, as hard and professionally suicidal
as it may seem at times to work in that direction.
It could be
someone agreeing to read Scripture because it’s a way of encouraging and
reaching out to others, even though they die of fright and embarrassment every
time they do it … or it could be a variety of churches and other communities of
faith working together in reading the signs of the times and offering good and
holy wisdom to the wider community, even though it means stepping outside their
shell and committing themselves to something bigger than just their own
survival.
It could be
something as simple as walking forward to light a candle to begin a worship
service … or as complicated and demanding as learning to lighten your own
footprint on Earth, and to enlighten your children and grand-children about
alternate ways of living for the good and well-being of all, even though it
means dying to many of our society’s notions of success and what makes for a
happy life, and exposing yourself perhaps to ridicule and embarrassment.
There’s some form
of dying, some kind of letting go, some form of self-denial for the sake of the
greater good in all these things. And
it’s the fear of dying that can hold us back.
Almost 40 years
in theology school – in a class on the theology of John Calvin, the professor
said one day that all spirituality – all spiritual practice, whether private
prayer and devotions or public worship and ritual, is about learning to die.
At the time I
thought he meant that our faith and our spiritual life are about preparing for
the day at the end of our life when we will finally die, to be able to die that one day in
such a way that when we leave this Earth we can be assured of going once and
for all to heaven.
Now, I wonder if
it means that spirituality – all true spiritual practice, is about learning to
die all through our life in the 1001 ways that will leave the Earth a better
place, the way God intends and hopes for it to be, and for ourselves to have a
true and good part in it.
“Unless a grain
of wheat is sown into the earth and dies to its own little self, it will
shrivel and perish; but if it dies to its own little self, it bears much fruit
and will be part of a great and good harvest.”
I have a feeling
it will take a lifetime for me to really know and do what that means. But what else is life for?
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