{"id":1097,"date":"2015-03-15T11:00:01","date_gmt":"2015-03-15T16:00:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/sermons\/?p=1097"},"modified":"2021-02-23T11:59:51","modified_gmt":"2021-02-23T16:59:51","slug":"religious-affections","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/sermons\/2015\/03\/15\/religious-affections\/","title":{"rendered":"Religious Affections"},"content":{"rendered":"

Click here to listen to the full service<\/a><\/p>\n

John 3:14-21<\/a><\/p>\n

Click here to listen to the sermon only<\/a><\/p>\n

Scripture<\/i><\/b><\/p>\n

Our newspaper reported this week about a man who built an igloo out of the snow mountain on his front lawn. \u00a0\u00a0The mounds of snow, several feet high and deep and wide, offered him an architectural opportunity. \u00a0Remembering his growing up years, he built igloo. \u00a0(He grew up, the paper said, in upstate New York.) \u00a0His igloo included four rooms. \u00a0His wife decorated the rooms with art-work and the window sills, open to the elements, with candles. \u00a0He was photographed and looked happy with his work. \u00a0It may have been that he recalled in the excavation some part of his growing up years, the habits he had acquired at an early age.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is no small matter whether one habit or the other is inculcated in us from early childhood; on the contrary, it makes a considerable difference, or, rather, all the difference.\u201d (repeat).<\/p>\n

This is the voice of Jonathan Edwards, with whom we converse, to some measure, in these Lenten sermons. \u00a0\u00a0Real religion involves religious affections, or so Edwards taught. \u00a0Give some consideration this morning to your own religious affections. \u00a0Your experience. \u00a0Your dispositions, inclinations, predilections, and affections.<\/p>\n

Just before our gospel reading, Nicodemus, thrice mentioned in John, has departed. \u00a0\u00a0You remember his interview with Jesus. \u00a0He asks about being born again. \u00a0He asks about resurrection life. \u00a0He asks about spirit. \u00a0In the nighttime interview, Jesus answers him: \u00a0You must be born anew. \u00a0Your religion, your religious affection, counts on this. \u00a0Our gospel today takes the same theme further.<\/p>\n

God is love. \u00a0(Or Love is God.) Eternal life is trust in God who is love. \u00a0The doorway to eternal life is trust. \u00a0We learn this in our experience. \u00a0This trust is a gift, God\u2019s gift. \u00a0With open hands we receive the gift of God. \u00a0\u00a0We do not achieve or earn or create this trust. \u00a0It is given to us. \u00a0The gift comes wrapped, belief and trust and faith and knowledge come gift wrapped in meaning, belonging, empowerment\u2014in the beloved community.<\/p>\n

To make sure the hearer and reader of his gospel get the full measure of his point, the author of John uses a great old word, Judgment. \u00a0KRISIS in Greek. \u00a0You hear our own word, CRISIS, there. \u00a0Until John, more or less, Judgment was reserved for the end of time, the eschaton, the apocalypse. \u00a0John, as is resonantly clear here, says something different. \u00a0Judgment is not at the end of time. \u00a0Judgment is now. \u00a0Judgment does not await the arrival of the Son of Man on the clouds of heaven, or the millennial reign, or wars and rumors of wars, or signs of the times. \u00a0No. \u00a0The critical moment is now. \u00a0John has replaced speculation with spirit. \u00a0John has replaced eschaton with eternal life. \u00a0John has replaced Armageddon with the artistry of every day. \u00a0John has courageously left behind that to which most of the rest of the New Testament still clings. \u00a0John has replaced then with now. \u00a0What courage! \u00a0The upshot of this change, as recorded in our Scripture today, is the near apotheosis of experience. \u00a0And as an ineffable mystery, they shall learn in their own experience, Who He is<\/i> (Schweitzer).<\/p>\n

In other words, the ancient near eastern apocalyptic, of heaven and end of time judgment, still present in various religious traditions, as we have tragic and sorrowful occasion to see in our own time and struggles with violence, is replaced. \u00a0In your experience. \u00a0This is the judgment. \u00a0The light has come into the world.<\/p>\n

As my grandmother used to ask, \u2018Are you walking in the light?\u2019<\/p>\n

Likewise, we notice that the letter to the Ephesians, written by a student of Paul, makes a complementary affirmation. \u00a0By grace you are saved through faith (he writes this twice, or an editor has added a second rendering). \u00a0The phrase, both in its repetition and in its cadence, seems clearly to be a prized inheritance for the Ephesians. \u00a0God is loving you into love and freeing you into freedom. \u00a0God first loved us. \u00a0You are not made whole by your doing. \u00a0You are God\u2019s beloved, and so are made whole, made healthy, made well, \u2018perfected\u2019. \u00a0\u00a0Both in our successes and in our failures, we truly depend upon a daily, weekly hearing of this promise and warning. \u00a0In our experience, we are given to trust God. \u00a0Our response in actions will then forever be overshadowed by real love, by God\u2019s love.<\/p>\n

Doctrine<\/i><\/b><\/p>\n

The Marsh pulpit in this decade has conversed come Lent with Calvinism, a sibling tradition, different in emphasis from our own, but one deeply embedded in the long history of New England. \u00a0My joy in learning more this winter about Jonathan Edwards, 1703-1758, a contemporary of John Wesley, I have shared only to encourage you to know something about him, too. \u00a0If in Northampton MA, you could visit his old haunts. \u00a0If reading about our American history, you could appreciate him through the critical and criticized masterpiece of Perry Miller. \u00a0If meditating you could re-focus in faith by recalling his emphasis on beauty, on excellence, on grace. \u00a0A University pulpit, like any, strives weekly to preach the gospel, as Augustine noted, \u2018to teach, to delight, and to persuade\u2019. \u00a0\u00a0In slight measure, our duty here may accentuate, at least come Lent, and its seasonal discipline of disciplines, the first, to teach.<\/p>\n

Today, as a doctrinal consequence upon our Holy Scripture, we shall simply, or singularly, approach Edward\u2019s consideration of experience, what he called the \u2018religious affections\u2019. \u00a0\u00a0He made his most careful study in this area, after the Great Awakening of 1740. \u00a0The evangelistic success of his preaching in Northampton, which brought George Whitefield to the farm country of western Massachusetts, strangely caused him consternation. \u00a0\u00a0He had occasion to question his own success. \u00a0That is, he wondered just how truly religious some of the newly acquired affections were, in North Hampton and beyond. \u00a0I find that in itself a remarkable, even heroic, spiritual move\u2014to find in your success an occasion for self-criticism.<\/p>\n

Edwards, good Puritan he, made two lists of twelve signs each, one a list of false signs of religious affection, and one a list of true.<\/p>\n

In an earlier version of the sermon I had these ready to give to you. \u00a0You may be relieved to know that what follows is a summary instead.<\/p>\n

Edwards distrusts appearances, when it comes to religion, with good Protestant and Biblical warrant, as you recognize. \u00a0He distrusts, you may be surprised to hear, given his fatherhood of the Great Awakening: \u00a0emotion, eagerness, excitement, biblical literacy, volubility, comfort, religious effort, self-confidence, verbosity, elocution, and impact on others. \u00a0This list he offered after, not before, the great religious upswing, known the world over, of 1740. \u00a0The fullness of love can actually be counterfeited, he judged (or maybe, he saw with his own eyes).<\/p>\n

Today we might say: \u00a0religion is not a good thing, or not necessarily a good thing. \u00a0Religion is like the weather, and theology in that way like meteorology. \u00a0It can be good. \u00a0But. \u00a0If it causes the brother to stumble\u2026If the Sabbath is not made for man\u2026If the inside of the cup is not cleansed\u2026If all that glitters is not gold\u2026If, with Cervantes and the Quixote, appearance threatens reality, then religion is not good. \u00a0Many great troubles today are religious, from Ferguson to Tikrit to Gaza to our own home and our own town.<\/p>\n

Rather, this quintessential Yankee Puritan Calvinist trusts reality, not appearance: \u00a0the divine source, the nature (insert Love) of God, holiness and beauty, intellectual understanding, humility, self-criticism, gentleness, tenderness, harmony\u2014in short, whatever is Christ-like. \u00a0He lived through the aftermath of two cycles of religious fervor, out in Northampton, and came out with a balance of wisdom like that of a serpent as well as innocence like that of a dove.<\/p>\n

Today we might say: \u00a0when you go to pray, enter your closet, and shut the door, and if you fast, wash your face and smile, and be not a saint abroad but a devil at home. \u00a0\u00a0Prefer a tithing Christian to a born again Christian every time.<\/p>\n

Edwards, then, puts a major daily question before us about religious affections, and about religious experience: what here is appearance and what here is reality?<\/p>\n

Application<\/i><\/b><\/p>\n

Moving, in good Puritan form, from Scripture, through Doctrine, to Application: \u00a0how shall we apply this to our own life today?<\/p>\n

On one hand, we might look at the modes of representation, of appearance, that intend or pretend to connect us in reality.<\/p>\n

For all our vaunted IT, are we any closer to IThou? \u00a0IT or IThou? \u00a0Not only for our soon to return undergraduates, but seriously for them, as well as for all of us, the question of this relationship looms. \u00a0Daily. \u00a0How much do the newer technologies aid us in the timeless challenge of becoming fully human?<\/p>\n

The Buddhist says: \u00a0Wherever you are, be there.<\/p>\n

Are we? \u00a0Are we ever truly anywhere anymore? \u00a0Are we ever unplugged to sufficient measure that we can relate to one another, to self, to world, to God?<\/p>\n

Are we ever fully free, heart and spirit, to see and be and be awed by the sunrise, to look at and be entranced by the night sky, to love and be in love with the beloved, to swim in the fresh water of freedom, grace and love? \u00a0Do we live to work or work to live? \u00a0Is there still a way through the snow pile to an igloo?<\/p>\n

The world does not revolve around my inbox, or yours.<\/p>\n

This is good news\u2014wisdom to the mighty, honor to the brave. \u00a0And it is good sense. \u00a0And even good business. \u00a0One writer noted: \u2018Every business person, regardless of national origin, is more likely to transact business with a colleague or counterpart he has worked and socialized with.\u2019 \u00a0Real commerce happens in real time, among real people, who really know and like and want to work with each other.<\/p>\n

Does e-mail and its cousins help make and keep human life fully human? Consider the mode: \u00a0No voice or face, nor body, nor personhood, nor privacy, nor life? \u00a0Who\u2014really\u2014beyond 15 minutes a day\u2014wants to communicate, or live, this way? \u00a0To say nothing of the practice of ministry. \u00a0How do we approach I\/Thou in the reign of I\/T?<\/p>\n

How do we \u00a0conjure and remember the \u00a0wisdom of Martin Buber?<\/p>\n

\u201cLove does not cling to the I in such a way as to have the Thou only for its ” content,” its object; but love is between I and Thou…<\/p>\n

The basic word I-You can only be spoken with one\u2019s whole being. The basic word I-It can never be spoken with one\u2019s whole being\u2026<\/p>\n

On the other hand, we might look at our more intimate relationships. \u00a0Five times this year we have spoken from this pulpit about safety on campus for women. \u00a0We shall continue to do so, so that Marsh Chapel, with partners near and far, will continue to be a sacred space that is a safe place. \u00a0The bifurcation of appearance and reality endemic to cyber culture\u2014think Yik Yak\u2014has consequences in many directions, one of which is the peril of losing the muscle and habit of interpersonal conversation, discourse, and\u2014affection. \u00a0It takes practice to learn to listen well and deeply. \u00a0It takes time to develop the vocabulary and tongue to speak from the heart. \u00a0It takes live experience, living engagement to see and hear others as multi-dimensional not one dimensional beings, real people not appearances. \u00a0All of us, older and younger, continue to learn and grow, and over time, a new and healthier national and collegiate culture will emerge.<\/p>\n

A recent review of the documentary, The Hunting Grounds<\/i>, by Ty Burr, raises the same point, in its conclusion: \u00a0Emotional intimacy can be found everywhere online while vanishing from the physical world. \u00a0The (movie) does a fine and fierce job of portraying campus sexual assault as a national disease. \u00a0It never dares to suggest that it\u2019s a symptom. (BG G6 3\/13\/15).<\/i><\/p>\n

Nietzsche famously argued that if God is dead everything is allowed. \u00a0With a wisp of John 2, and faith and trust and belief still in the air, like a harbinger of a spring not quite here, we might put it otherwise, and in a positive mode. \u00a0If the language of worship, of divine love and a responsive human love, can be learned and lifted and shared, then there is a capacity, a cultural capacity, a cultural syntax and grammar and spelling that gradually can offer an alternative to our current malaise. \u00a0Affection, real emotional intimacy in word and deed, might find its wellsprings in Religious Affections, real emotional intimacy in word and deed:<\/p>\n

God so loved the world that he gave his only Son.<\/i><\/p>\n

Then\u2026<\/i><\/p>\n

Because God made the stars to shine. \u00a0Because God made the ivy twine. \u00a0Because God made the ocean blue. \u00a0Because God made you, that\u2019s why I love you.<\/i><\/p>\n

With joy, right here, in these years, we have seen young life become new life, as we have in some beautiful weddings this winter. \u00a0This happens in college. One of the sources of healing on campus is worship. \u00a0\u00a0Against all odds, in the Hunting Grounds, it may just be the one thing needful. \u00a0One who knows in experience the love of God has then the heart with which to love another. \u00a0And the language. \u00a0And the sensitivity. \u00a0And the humanity. \u00a0And the capacity. \u00a0The capacity to defeat rapacity.<\/p>\n

Hear the Gospel! \u00a0Scripture: \u00a0Your experience counts. \u00a0Doctrine: Reality not appearance is at the core of religious affections. \u00a0Application: \u00a0Balance IT and IThou, and let your affections be formed and informed by your religious affections.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is no small matter whether one habit or the other is inculcated in us from early childhood; on the contrary, it makes a considerable difference, or, rather, all the difference.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n

-The Rev. Dr. Robert Allan Hill, Dean of Marsh Chapel<\/a><\/p>\n

For more information about Marsh Chapel at Boston University,\u00a0click here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

For information about donating to the Chapel,\u00a0click here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Click here to listen to the full service John 3:14-21 Click here to listen to the sermon only Scripture Our newspaper reported this week about a man who built an igloo out of the snow mountain on his front lawn. \u00a0\u00a0The mounds of snow, several feet high and deep and wide, offered him an architectural […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2679,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[45,22],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1097"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2679"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1097"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1097\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1100,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1097\/revisions\/1100"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1097"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1097"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1097"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}