The Ven. Richard I Cluett
October 29, 2006
Job 42:1-6, 10-17 + Mark 10:46-52
How are you going to get through this life? How are you going to make it? What will it take for you to make it through this life with your self intact; with your integrity, with self-respect, with honor?
What will be your legacy for those you love, those closest to you, your associates, your neighbors, your small part of the world? What will be known of your beliefs, your values, your worldview, and your faith?
What will your children and grandchildren and nieces and nephews know about you? About what’s important to you? How you view the world? What will they know and how will they know it?
Bishop Mark Dyer used to say that a person’s legacy could be seen in their calendar and in their checkbook. How we spend our time and our money are the best clues to what we value.
Are you a glass half-full person or a glass half-empty person? Are you a person who lives out of poverty – a sense that there never is enough; never enough time, enough money, enough resources, enough love, enough good will? Or are you a person who lives out of a sense of abundance; there’s enough to go around, there’s enough to do the job, there’s enough?
These are discipleship questions and these are stewardship questions. They are some of the questions raised by Job, both the man and the book.
This morning we hear Job acknowledge before God that God is God, and before God he is, and we are, but dust and ashes. Without God’s enlivening, creative, empowering spirit, the world is but dust and ashes.
But because God is God, Job is willing to risk it all again as he enters life anew, as he rebuilds his life again, knowing that it all could be lost again.
God's reasons for giving things to Job are as unexplained as the reasons they were taken away. God does not explain suffering, but God does not explain beatitude either. They are twin mysteries. The sources of each are hidden from our view, beyond our understanding.
But Job is willing to try again, risk again, and live again. Job has learned that chaos is inherently part of life. And that God provides the resources to make our way through the chaos and the ambiguity of life.
The chaos of the world is not the end or the answer. The answer is found in how we make our way through this life. Are we willing to risk with Job that God’s creation is inherently good? Are we willing to trust, to bet our lives that the God shown in Jesus Christ is the ONE who creates, who saves, who sustains, who will empower our ability to make our way through this life knowing grace and mercy?
What changed for Job was his perspective. The way we see, know, understand, and believe will determine whether the chaos of the world will reign in our lives, whether the circumstances of life will beat us down, whether we sink or whether we soar as if on the wings of eagles.
Many of you know that I was away last week to lead a conference for clergy; a wellness conference called CREDO. We have all learned that CREDO is the Latin word for “I believe”. But CREDO does not mean, “I believe” in the sense of intellectual assent to this or that proposition. (I agree with Dr. Einstein that e=mc2.) It means, “I give my heart to this.” It is an expression of my heart’s commitment and heart’s orientation. In the creed saying, I believe/I give my heart to the Father…
To what do you give your heart? To whom do you give your heart? That is a discipleship question. The stewardship question is what you do after you say, I believe, I give my heart to…?
Has Jesus opened your eyes to see the hand of God at work in the world around us? Or are you afflicted with the metaphorical blindness of Bartimaeus? The healing of Bartimaeus by Jesus gave Bartimaeus a new perspective, a new life.
Jesus was not only the sign of God’s kingdom; he was also the agent of God’s kingdom. Where he went he brought a new perspective; he brought the chance of new life for those who would believe. He brings to each of us a new way of seeing the world, a new perspective on how life is to be lived, and a new responsibility to join him in being agents of the Kingdom of God.
Where we go we are to bring life and healing, we are to help people know that God’s reign has begun and it includes them. We do that individually, but probably we do it most powerfully when we join together in the mission and ministry of this cathedral church. When we together witness to the world, to our neighborhood, and to one another that God’s hand is powerfully and importantly at work reweaving the torn fabric of creation, restoring to health and wholeness those whom the world has beaten down, those who have succumbed to the chaos in their lives, those who have been oppressed by evil powers of this world; bringing new life to lives that had appeared as though dead.
That’s what we are about here. That’s why God has placed us here. The Cathedral Church of the Nativity. And if we fail or fall short because of fear or timidity or lack of resources, we will have succumbed to chaos ourselves.
So what we do here and how we live here have both immediate and eternal consequences. The immediate consequences have to do with the well-being of God’s people; the eternal consequences have to do with how we will stand before the judgment seat of God. What will be the evidence, the testimony of our life? What will be our legacy as a community, as a person?
Next week when each of us is asked to make a financial commitment to Nativity, this is what we are being asked. Will we be faithful in our mission and our ministry; will we have the resources necessary to do the work we have been given to do?
I want you to think about these things as you make your pledge next Sunday. I don’t want you to think about paying your dues to pay the church bills. I want you to think about your soul’s health and your soul-legacy. I want you to think about this mission God has given this cathedral church.
Will you decide to stretch yourself in response to God’s abundant presence and power in your life? Will you decide to stretch yourself to bring new life and the light of Christ to those in need of God’s abundant presence and power in their lives? I pray each of us will.
According to Job and to Jesus, it is never too late to gain a new perspective. It is never to late start – again.
