Who do you Want to be When you Grow Up? Preached at Wollaston Congregational Church On March 12th, 2017 Scripture: John 3:1-17 Who do you want to be when you grow up? Beyoncé… Steve Jobs or Bill Gates … JK Rowling … Michael Jordan … Ellen De Generes? Celebrities and those who have “made it” in their field, are often held up as great role models. But, is there a person you know personally who is your model of a life well lived? Maybe a teacher, coach, grandparent, or friend. How does that person look to you? What values do they reflect? Perhaps, integrity or authenticity, spirituality, compassion? My guess is that this person is not an anxious presence in your life, probably the reverse. My guess is that this person lives authentically: their values are reflected in their actions. My guess is that this person is unhurried, and rarely reactive, that their responses are careful and measured. One person I remember as a model to me is Hannah, a woman who had children around the same time I did. Hannah stood head and shoulders above the other moms who used to get together. This is not because she was high achieving. She wasn’t balancing a stellar career with the responsibilities of parenting at the time. She just seemed to know how to mother, not only her own children but those of others too including the children she fostered. Hannah may well have studied child development and parental skills, but that isn’t what impressed me most. It was her presence. It was her low, soothing voice, her graceful way of moving through the world. It was her ability to remain calm when the children acted up. Meeting their struggles and frustrations with compassion. It was her clarity about when to step up and get involved, in church or in school, and when to step back and let others take responsibility. One time in particular, Hannah bailed me out of a situation I had managed poorly. We were with our daughters’ Girl Scout troop on a hiking expedition one early March day. I think it was right around this time of year. The girls were maybe in 5th or 6th grade at the time. We had hiked in snow shoes up a steep icy path, to the foot of the Mount Washington trail. Many of the girls had removed their snow shoes as they were not ideal for the conditions. Then one girl realized she needed to get her shoes back on again. I tried to help. We could hardly bear to take of our gloves in the stinging icy wind, but adjusting the snow shoes needed nimble fingers. The buckles and straps we now stiff, difficult to fasten, in the cold. The girl had had it with the hike and with the shoes. She sobbed, as she stood, unhelpful, wanting me to put her snow shoes on for her. “Put your foot in the shoe, Grace!” My voice was raised. “I can’t!” She sobbed. “Then I can’t help you …” I said. I stormed off to the other moms, who were resting on a rock. “Grace is just so whiny, she won’t even try to put her snow shoe on. I can’t help her!” I said in frustration. Hannah empathized with me, but a few minutes later I saw her with Grace, gently encouraging her. The snow shoe was soon on. I had a lot to learn from that encounter. I felt embarrassed that Hannah had handled what I had not done well. But I also had a model, someone I could see had an attitude I could aspire to. Hannah is someone I want to be when I grow up. In our gospel story today Nicodemus comes to Jesus under the cover of night. For some reason he doesn’t want anyone to know he is seeking out the guidance of the teacher. As a leader of the Judean Pharisees, maybe he thinks it would be dangerous for him to be seen with Jesus. But, perhaps, also he is also embarrassed and uncomfortable. Jesus has made an impression on Nicodemus, a religious leader, one who is supposed to be an expert in religion. In Jesus, Nicodemus recognizes an authenticity and a relationship with God that can not be denied. Even at this early stage in Jesus’ ministry the signs, such as turning water into wine at the wedding in Cana, show the divine presence in this man. Nicodemus has seen signs and wonders, but Jesus challenges him to perceive the Reign of God. Nicodemus has seen discrete actions and miracles, but Jesus challenges him to see the whole big picture. To do that Nicodemus needs to take on a new perspective. He cannot see God’s realm coming into the world, from the place where he is standing. He needs to give up his posture and prestige as leader of the Judean Pharisees, and become as a newborn. Jesus says to him that all people must be born anew, to see God’s realm. Father Richard Rohr is a Franciscan priest and the founder of the Center for Action and Contemplation in Albuquerque He is also author of the book “Falling Upward.” In his writing Father Rohr describes the concept of the “second half of life” first introduced by Carl Jung. I think that this is what Jesus is getting at here. [1] For Nicodemus to perceive the Reign of God, as it is coming into the world, in Jesus, he needs to enter the second half of life, or the “second naiveté”. The ones in this stage of life are humble: they’re beyond the “I’m in control” self-delusion. They have moved beyond the need to be constantly busy and productive. They’ve got there by crisis (health or loss), or by simple devotion and maturity. Nicodemus and the Pharisees portrayed in John’s gospel are continually concerned with purity codes. Richard Rohr says “first half of life religion is almost always about various types of purity codes. [These are the] – ‘thou shalt nots’ to keep us up, clear, clean, and together, like good Boy or Girl Scouts.” It is not wrong to be in the first half of life, it is actually necessary! Father Rohr says there are two major tasks in life. “The first is to build a strong ego ‘container’ or identity; the second is to find the contents that container was meant to hold.” We need to practice keeping the rules before we can determine when we need to let them go. We need to have the experience of productivity, so that we can recognize when it has a goal in itself. For myself, I needed to learn that insistence on self-reliance and a cheerful attitude for a Girl Scout was OK at the bottom of the mountain. But it was not OK for me to use these principles to vent my own frustration. I needed to become the adult in the situation, and show compassion for a cold and scared pre-teen up on the mountain. Growing into the second half of life means becoming a real grownup. It means making peace with the certainty of death. People who achieve this level of maturity begin to value the things of faith that seemed childish or ridiculous in the past. They embrace the stories and symbols for their deeper truth and meaning. Father Rohr also says “[the second half of life] is not always a chronological matter – I've met 11 year-old children in cancer wards who are in the second half of life, and I have met 68 year-old men like me who are still in the first half of life.” The second half of life is not necessarily about being old. This Lenten time, we are walking the way of faith. We are seeking spiritual growth, perhaps we will even be born anew. Jesus doesn’t give Nicodemus a road map for this process. Perhaps he just needs to let the idea sit with him for a while. Father Rohr tells us that the path to the second half of life often involves a crisis, such as a loss or upheaval in one’s life. That certainly rings true with the factors that most often propel people to begin attending a church. The four D’s: death, divorce, displacement, disaster. But Father Rohr also mentions getting there by simple devotion and maturity. I would suggest that self-awareness and emulation of our chosen model might help us along the way. I still want to be Hannah when I grow up. There are others too:
So, who do you want to be when you grow up? What will it take for you to be born anew? How will you perceive things in a new light, perhaps through a different lens, a different perspective. This is the task of our Lenten journey. May it be so. Amen [1] Richard Rohr, Falling Upward: A Spirituality for the Two Halves of Life, (Jossey-Bass, San Francisco CA, 2011)
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