Stay Awake... Keep Noticing Preached on November 12th, 2017 Scripture: Matthew 25:1-13 There are just three more Sundays left in the church year, including today. On November 26th we will celebrate “Reign of Christ Sunday”, before beginning again with the first season of Church year: Advent. In these last weeks of the year, Jesus’ teachings turn our attention toward “the Christ.” That is, the One whom Jesus has been, with the Father from the beginning, and the One he will continue to be when he no longer walks bodily in the world. Writer and Franciscan Mystic, Fr. Richard Rohr says, “Christ is not Jesus’ last name, but the title of his historical and cosmic purpose …Whenever the material and the spiritual coincide, there is the Christ … the Christ comes again whenever we are able to see the spiritual and the material coexisting in any moment, in any event, and in any person. All matter reveals Spirit, and Spirit needs matter to ‘show itself’!” [1] Fr. Rohr believe that “‘the Second Coming of Christ’ happens whenever and wherever we allow this to be utterly true for us.” These is a difficult concept to grasp, and yet if we absorb its meaning, our understanding of Jesus’ teachings in these last days will be all the richer. Let’s keep these thoughts in the back of our mind, as we consider the Gospel message for today. So, we are still in Matthew’s gospel with Jesus in Jerusalem in the final days before his crucifixion. Jesus finally leaves the temple following much teaching and many questions from the religious leaders. He then leads the disciples to the Mount of Olives where he begins to talk with them privately. The topic of the conversation continues to be what will happen when he is gone. In this remaining time before his arrest and crucifixion, he warns them, repeatedly, to be ready. They cannot afford to get sleepy, they are to be watchful for signs of his return … signs of his presence. He emphasizes this over and over. It is as if his return really depends upon their noticing. Then, as is his habit, he tells a parable. It’s one of those kingdom of heaven/wedding feast analogies, that really turns things upside down. Ten bridesmaids go to meet a bridegroom. The groom is occupied by the final negotiations for a bride price with the bride’s father. As always, Jesus stories are embedded in the culture of 1st century Palestine, including a patriarchal approach to marriage. The tradition is that the bridesmaids will meet the groom and accompany him to the bride’s house for their wedding. They are to bring lamps, because these negotiations are known to go on into the night. Five of these bridesmaids, known as the wise ones, are prepared with extra oil, just in case. The other five, described as foolish, are unprepared. They have no extra oil, they don’t have the insider knowledge about needing extra oil. Once their lamps burn out that will be it. The negotiations are exceptionally long. We can imagine the bridesmaids maybe waiting, catching up on the latest gossip, on the porch. As the time goes on they all fall asleep. Finally the bridegroom emerges, a shout goes out, “come and meet the groom!” This is the bridesmaids’ opportunity to do their job. It is darkest time of night and groom will need their light to lead his way to the bride. The “wise” bridesmaids may be prepared, but they’re not kind. They are unwilling to share their oil with the others who have run out. Smug that they have thought ahead and brought extra oil. I’m inclined to rename these “wise” bridesmaids, the mean bridesmaids. And so the foolish ones panic and rush off, fumbling in the dark, to the dealers to try and buy more oil. I don’t know what kind of dealer would be open at midnight, but because they were gone they miss the bridegroom. When they do return and knock on the door, which is already shut, the bridegroom refuses them entry, saying that he does not know them. The bridesmaids are not the only ones who are mean. Having told this story, Jesus repeats his warning to the disciples, keep awake, be alert. This insistence on being awake and noticing things, reminds me of an interview I heard recently on the Public Radio show “On Being” with Harvard Professor of Psychology, Ellen Langer. [2] Langer’s work focuses on mindfulness as a means to better health, competence and happiness. Langer doesn’t focus on meditation or yoga, although she agrees that these practices can be helpful. Instead she defines mindfulness as “the simple act of actively noticing new things,” being present to each moment. Langer gives an example of noticing “… you’re going to go home tonight and, if you live with somebody, notice five new things about that person … it can be very specific. And what will happen is, the person will start to come alive for you again, and that facilitates the relationship.” The kind of mindfulness Langer is talking about, and I believe Jesus is talking about to the disciples, means being present to all that is going on in the moment. Noticing draws us more deeply into relationship with those around us and it draws us more deeply into relationship with the created world. And so, according to Fr. Rohr it draws us more deeply into relationship with Christ … the Christ who comes again whenever we are able to see the spiritual and the material coexisting in the given moment. Now, like many others, I often move through the world in a mindless way, as Ellen Langer would describe it. Let me give you an example. Before I went to theological school, I worked in the Information Technology department of a large city hospital. When I first went to work at the hospital I felt very aware of the environment: of sick people, anxious family members, and slow, elderly people moving through the hallways. But, as time went by I became more familiar and rather mindless about my surroundings. When I went with my colleagues for lunch, I’d rush through the doorways or into the elevators without a thought. I wouldn’t notice the sick, anxious or elderly people I was passing by. A few years later, having left that job, I began my chaplaincy placement for ministry in a different medical setting. During the orientation, I was sent with another student, to pick up my id badge. We hit the up button at the elevator bank and waited, chatting about this and that. When the elevator arrived I was just about to jump in. But my fellow student stood back, graciously allowing an elderly resident to go in first. I was ashamed of my mindlessness, but I was grateful for the teaching moment. Having spent 7 months in that residential facility I learned to be more mindful of the way that so many elderly folks move in the world. I became mindful of the confusion they experience when they are rushed. I noticed how much more grounded I feel when I wait for them, holding a door or moving an obstacle out of the way, instead of rushing by mindlessly. That kind of mindfulness led me to other kinds of noticing. Perhaps you notice these things too: the flutter of a leaf in the wind; the winsome call of birds gathering in formation to fly south; the change in your partner’s gait or posture … perhaps indicating a tense muscle or a weary sadness; the $20 bill that falls from the elderly citizen’s wallet in the grocery store as he shuffles up in line, giving you the opportunity to return that money to its owner and say hello; turning back as you enter the convenience, so that you notice and assist the frazzled mother negotiating a double stroller through the awkward door. Noticing allows me to move through the world making eye contact, exchanging smiles. Sometimes I feel like only one, as I glance around the train car and see eyes, suspiciously glued to cell phones. I take joy in occasionally finding a co-conspirator in the noticing game, who’s willing to return my smile. Keeping awake and noticing, facilitates relationship. Keeping awake and noticing, allows the material and the spiritual coincide in our consciousness … and there is the Christ. And so that weird wedding parable, again. What do we notice? Well, the first thing is that your preacher managed to remain awake this week, and noticed something particular about the introduction to the parable. It’s like that wedding parable we had a few weeks ago. “The kingdom has been likened to…” Indeed, the kingdom has been likened to this, by those who don’t understand the kingdom. Each week we examine the excerpt from the scripture assigned for that Sunday. But it’s not wise to read any part of the gospel without reference to the whole. In Matthew’s gospel, Jesus has already given his blessing to the merciful and to the peacemakers. He has declared that his followers “are the light of the world.” And in a couple of weeks we’ll hear another teaching in which he says that whenever they do something for the hungry, the thirsty, the sick and those in prison, they do it for him. Whatever would lead anyone to believe that if they were bridesmaids in a wedding, they would not share the oil for their lamps? Whoever would listen to the gospel and think that we are to keep our understanding of Christ coming into the world to ourselves? And whoever would believe that the One who said “knock, and the door will be opened for you” would then shut the door in the face of those without insider knowledge? Noticing isn’t simply about seeing the Christ in the world and filing that encounter under spiritual experiences. Noticing is about seeing the Christ manifest in the small acts of generosity, forgiveness and mercy, and justice. Noticing involves lifting up and magnifying those encounters for all to see. So my friends, I recommend that you stay awake, and when you leave this place I invite you to go out into the world noticing. May it be so. Amen. [1] https://cac.org/second-coming-christ-2016-10-30/ [2]https://onbeing.org/programs/ellen-langer-science-of-mindlessness-and-mindfulness-nov2017/
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