{"id":2095,"date":"2018-10-21T11:00:18","date_gmt":"2018-10-21T16:00:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/sermons\/?p=2095"},"modified":"2019-09-17T11:56:33","modified_gmt":"2019-09-17T15:56:33","slug":"the-present-moment-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/sermons\/2018\/10\/21\/the-present-moment-2\/","title":{"rendered":"The Present Moment (2)"},"content":{"rendered":"

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

Mark 10: 17-34<\/a><\/p>\n

Click here to listen to the sermon\u00a0only<\/a><\/p>\n

Frontispiece<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

The Present Moment. <\/em><\/p>\n

\u00a0Lift up your hearts in the present moment, to hear the good news within the present moment.<\/em>\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

A word of faith in a pastoral voice toward a common hope.<\/em><\/p>\n

Hope has two handsome sons, Presence and Pressure. \u00a0Both meet you in the Present Moment.<\/em><\/p>\n

The presence of Love.\u00a0 The pressure to Love.\u00a0 The presence of Good.\u00a0 The pressure toward Good.<\/em><\/p>\n

I need Thy presence every passing hour;<\/em><\/p>\n

What but Thy grace can foil the tempter\u2019s power?<\/em><\/p>\n

Who, like Thyself, my guide and stay can be?<\/em><\/p>\n

Through cloud and sunshine, Lord, abide with me.<\/em><\/p>\n

The Present Moment:\u00a0 The presence of Good.\u00a0 The pressure toward Good.<\/em><\/p>\n

Pressure<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Hear good news.\u00a0 Just as the present moment, for all its dangers and diminutions, reveals presence, the presence of Love, as we affirmed last week, so too the present moment, for all its tweets and humiliations, reveals the pressure of Good, the pressure toward Good, as we affirm this week.\u00a0 Hope\u2019s second handsome son is pressure.<\/p>\n

After worship here at Marsh Chapel last Sunday, you may have noticed that our student mission team set up a table on the Plaza.\u00a0 They are called MOVE, this team, the acronym of whose actual words I can never remember, but it doesn\u2019t matter.\u00a0 These our beloved students are ON THE MOVE.\u00a0 And that is the point, is it not?\u00a0 They went out to Commonwealth Avenue, armed only with a table, a box of pamphlets, their camaraderie, and also, one guesses, for that present moment, perhaps one other thing: the wind of pressure blowing their lives, like leaves in the breeze, to paraphrase Rowan Williams, toward some Good, toward some Goodness.\u00a0 They spent part of the day passing out information on how to register to vote.<\/p>\n

They were moved to pressure, to press on, to impress, to press on toward the high prize, to do something good.\u00a0 Who knows whence that sort of impetus emerges?\u00a0 But it does.\u00a0 In the present.\u00a0 In the present moment.\u00a0 And of sudden you are greeted by Hope\u2019s second handsome son, Pressure.<\/p>\n

Notice in our Gospel how the rich young ruler presses. \u00a0He presses the point. \u00a0He is not satisfied with a generic response, in this case an odd listing and partial assortment of the commandments.\u00a0 Jesus has answered, giving the points of the law, though notice only some, and notice in odd order. \u00a0 But in the question, and again in the answer, there is a pressure, there is pressure. \u00a0Is this why the church\u2019s memory of the conversation includes the phrase, \u2018and Jesus loved him?\u2019 The Good presses the rich young ruler to question. \u00a0The Good presses the Lord Christ, in his Risen Voice, Remembered and Interpreted in the Life of the Earliest Church, to answer. \u00a0One thing you lack.<\/p>\n

There is, in this Present Moment, in every present moment the pressure to goodness, to act in goodness.\u00a0 We come to church for such a reminder, especially in a national season of the shredding of ceremonies of courtesy, in a national season of the apotheosis of the uncivil.\u00a0 And a willingness on the part of many to support or countenance the denigration of civil society, and the abuse of inherited forms of culture meant to protect us from our basest selves.<\/p>\n

Mark 10<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Look for a moment again at our gospel reading.\u00a0 Barbara Brown Taylor said once, if memory serves, that the church usually misses the point of this teaching, either by understanding the passage exclusively in terms of money, or by avoiding altogether any discussion of money. \u00a0 She said further that money is like nuclear power, potent with power for good, but requiring careful management, protections against disasters, recognition of what can go wrong, and a humility in practice.<\/p>\n

In the city of Rome, under the thumb of Caesar, Mark in 70ad rehearses Jesus\u2019 lakeside lessons.\u00a0 Gathered in secrecy, hearing news of a Jerusalem temple in flames, rightly fearing impending persecutions, Mark\u2019s Roman Christians heard hope in these teachings, so frequently as today related to wealth.\u00a0 If you notice only one word in this passage, mark Mark\u2019s inclusion of \u201cpersecutions\u201d (vs. 30).<\/p>\n

For there is an urgency to Mark\u2019s passage that Matthew and Luke later left behind.\u00a0 Mark exudes raw energy under the pressure of apocalyptic expectation.\u00a0 Sell and give!\u00a0 Notice the telltale apocalyptic marks:\u00a0 eternal life (the coming resurrection of the dead); this age and the age to come (the heart of Jewish longing); camel and needle (end of an age hyperbole); none is good but God (the apocalyptic distance of heaven from earth); the reign of God (the essential apocalyptic hope);\u00a0 persecutions (harbinger of the end); last become first (apocalyptic justice).\u00a0 But there is no mistaking the primary announcement: \u00a0life is found in the refreshing lake water of giving not on the dry shoreline of having.\u00a0 Yes, you must honor the past, including the commandments.\u00a0 Yes, we must conserve and protect.\u00a0 But as Luke Timothy Johnson used to say:\u00a0 \u201cthe tradition of the church is meant to open the future!\u201d\u00a0 Conserve what you can and protect what you must, then give\u2014develop, give\u2014enhance, give\u2014open the reign of God!\u00a0 This is what life is all about.\u00a0 And be shrewd about it.<\/p>\n

Toward the end of one remarkable election in California, a leader in LA memorably implored his people to look to the future:\u00a0 \u201cThink of your future.\u00a0 Look to the next generation.\u00a0 See what is out ahead.\u00a0 Why if you vote for (candidate x) it would be like a chicken voting for Colonel Sanders!\u201d\u00a0 He could speak apocalyptic.<\/p>\n

Mark\u2019s Way<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 And Mark is clearly an apocalyptic writing, although clarity about this has only fully emerged in the last generation or so.\u00a0 Mark expects the end of all things in his own time, 70ad and so the Markan Jesus so instructs his followers, 30ad.\u00a0 In fact, Mark expects the culmination of all things, soon and very soon.\u00a0 In this regard, and in regard to his understanding of the cross, Mark has some congruence with the letters of Paul.\u00a0 Given this apocalyptic perspective, should we hear Mark\u2019s words as those of a critic or those of a coach?<\/p>\n

The first option, Mark the moderate critic, was most piercingly presented almost forty years ago, by a friend of Marsh Chapel, Dr. Theodore Weeden. It has taken some decades for the force and power of his argument to stand up and stand out in comparison to the work of others.<\/p>\n

On this view, Mark combats a view of Jesus that will not accept his suffering, his crucifixion.\u00a0 Long after the events of Calvary and Golgotha, spirited and strong people, singing a happy song, have caused the earliest church to forget their baptism, or its meaning.\u00a0 They expect ease, spirit, joy, and, soon, a conquering victory over all that plagues and persecutes them.\u00a0 Mark says \u2018no\u2019.\u00a0 To say \u2018no\u2019 Mark remembers in delicate detail the story of Jesus\u2019 passion, relying on a source, a document he has inherited.\u00a0 To say \u2018no\u2019, Mark pointedly shows the ignorance and cowardice of Peter, at Caesarea Philippi and in Jerusalem.\u00a0 To say \u2018no\u2019, Mark criticizes, diminishes the miracles of Jesus, letting them wind away to nothing as the Gospel progresses.\u00a0 To say \u2018no\u2019, Mark describes the disciples as diabolical dunces.\u00a0 They didn\u2019t understand it and neither do you, he says.\u00a0 Mark stays within the fold of the inherited story of Jesus, the gospel of teaching and passion, of Galilee and Jerusalem.\u00a0 But he does so as a moderate critic of those who are unrealistic about the suffering that continues, from which the gospel does not deliver, any more than Jesus had been delivered from the cross.\u00a0 Resurrected, yes, delivered, no.\u00a0 On this view, at the heart of Mark there is a bitter dispute in earliest Christianity (imagine that) about what constitutes discipleship and baptism, and Mark is out to prove his opponents wrong.\u00a0 As with the alternative, there is plenty of evidence to support this view.<\/p>\n

The alternative, the second option, Mark the critical moderate, has in a way been present for a longer time, and, one could say, is still the more dominant, the majoritarian position, in scholarly interpretation of Mark.\u00a0 The current, culminating presentation of this view is in a two volume Anchor Bible Commentary. \u00a0It is written by another person with connections to Marsh Chapel, a fellow once on the faculty of Boston University School of Theology, Joel Marcus, now at Duke. \u00a0On this view, things in Mark\u2019s community are not so much at daggers drawn.\u00a0 There are differences to be sure, but the disagreements are differences among friends.\u00a0 The Markan coaching does not face strong spirit people, committed to an idea of the \u2018divine man\u2019.\u00a0 Mark is not so negative about miracles.\u00a0 The disciples are mistaken but not malevolent.\u00a0 The titles for Jesus are not so tellingly convincing.\u00a0 The real trouble is not so much in the community itself (perish the thought), but outside, among the potential deceivers of the church.\u00a0 Hence, on this view, Mark has the job of gently reminding his hearers of the cross, of suffering, of discipline, of the cruciform character of Christianity, as a moderate, a critical moderate, but a moderate more than a critic.<\/p>\n

A Critic and a Coach<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 In the Present Moment, the pressure toward the Good can come in a voice on the one hand critical, or in a voice on the other hand coaching.\u00a0\u00a0 You might think about how you use your voice, now and then, in one form or another.\u00a0 Children need both.\u00a0 So do parents.\u00a0 While the jury is out, still, about Mark, whether more critic or more coach, there is no doubt about his apocalyptic urgency, and there is no doubt about the pressure it applies, in the Present Moment, the pressure to do good, to be good, to practice good, the pressure toward the Good.<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/em>Earlier this month, the paper of record in this country carried two articles, one on a Thursday, one on a Saturday.\u00a0 Both were written by friends of yours, Marsh Chapel.\u00a0 Both exhibited this pressure toward the good, Marsh Chapel.\u00a0 Both were written in part to critique and in part to coach.\u00a0 Both voices are known to you.<\/p>\n

Andrew Bacevich, until just recently a professor at Boston University, has been among you.\u00a0 You know his voice.\u00a0 He has been here to teach in our small group, to provide a chapel forum for us, to speak in trenchant terms, terms full of the pressure toward good.\u00a0 This month he wrote in the NY Times about Black Hawk Down, 25 years later, in his ongoing quest to challenge, to critique, our national reliance on large scale military might.\u00a0 We might\u00a0 have learned something, back then, he says.\u00a0 He presses us.\u00a0 \u2018The contemporary battlefield is more likely to be urban and congested\u2026investment in conventional warfare will continue to have little relevance\u2026policy should consider\u2026that the wars themselves\u2026might be futile.\u2019\u00a0 And then, the clincher: \u2018With a bit more effort, and a generous dose of humility…\u2019 we might have learned these lessons 25 years ago.\u00a0\u00a0 Here is a close, critical voice, part of the proven pressure toward good, latent in every one present moment.<\/p>\n

Robert Pinsky, former US poet laureate, and a professor at Boston University, wrote two days later, in the same space.\u00a0 You remember him, Marsh Chapel.\u00a0 Pinsky came and helped us honor and respect those who died on nineleven<\/em>, ten years later.\u00a0 He brought himself, he brought his poetry, he brought his voice, right here onto our plaza, in our 2011 service of remembrance.\u00a0 You know his voice.\u00a0 This month he wrote in the NY Times about patriotism.\u00a0 He presses us.\u00a0 He is writing for students, including those within earshot this morning, saying, \u2018Sometimes you read something when you are young and it stays with you forever\u2019.\u00a0 He then remembers a citation of George Washington in 1783 \u2018in which he described the good fortune of the new nation:\u00a0 its natural resources, its political independence and freedom, and the Age of Reason of the country\u2019s birth, and age of the free cultivation of letters, the unbounded extension of commerce, the progressive refinement of manners, the growing liberality of sentiment, and above all the pure and benign light of Revelation\u2019.\u00a0 <\/em>And then, in some emotion, and with the great skill of a great poet, he simply remembers the story of Peter Rodino, a humble congressman from his native New Jersey, pressed into duty, we might say under the pressure toward the Good, in the Watergate hearings. Here is a close, coaching voice, part of the proven pressure toward good, latent in every one present moment.<\/p>\n

You are not alone in the hunger and thirst for the good.\u00a0 Voices both critical and coaching are among you, to help, to guide, to heal.\u00a0 Listen for them.\u00a0 Listen to them.\u00a0 And learn from them, learn to find your own voice, both critic and coach.<\/p>\n

A Question<\/em><\/strong>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/strong>On Monday evening this past week, you may have walked past the cafeteria at 100 Bay State Road.\u00a0 There you would have seen a lone woman, sitting in a chair.\u00a0 Her hair gray, her presence little noticed, her age probably making her eligible for Medicare, armed only with a table, a box of voter registration pamphlets, and also, one guesses, for that present moment, perhaps one other thing: the wind of pressure blowing her life, like leaves on the breeze, to paraphrase Rowan Williams, toward some Good, toward some Goodness.\u00a0 She spent part of that evening passing out information on how to register to vote.\u00a0 Maybe a couple of generations ago she was member of a student group like MOVE.\u00a0 Or maybe she is foretaste of what our students will be and do a couple of generations from now, when their hair is gray, and they are eligible for Medicare.\u00a0\u00a0 \u2018Good for you\u2019 we said to her.\u00a0 \u2018I\u2019m trying\u2019 she replied.<\/p>\n

And you?\u00a0 May I ask you a question, to conclude this sermon?\u00a0 Will you, before you leave this Sanctuary, consider one thing you might do toward the Good, in the next week, something you have not yet to this moment designed?\u00a0 In the present moment?<\/p>\n

Coda<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

The Present Moment. <\/em><\/p>\n

\u00a0Lift up your hearts in the present moment, to hear the good news within the present moment.<\/em>\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

A word of faith in a pastoral voice toward a common hope.<\/em>\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

Hope has two handsome sons, Presence and Pressure. \u00a0Both meet you in the Present Moment.<\/em><\/p>\n

The presence of Love.\u00a0 The pressure to Love.\u00a0 The presence of Good.\u00a0 The pressure toward Good.<\/em>\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

I need Thy presence every passing hour;<\/em><\/p>\n

What but Thy grace can foil the tempter\u2019s power?<\/em><\/p>\n

Who, like Thyself, my guide and stay can be?<\/em><\/p>\n

Through cloud and sunshine, Lord, abide with me.<\/em><\/p>\n

The Present Moment:\u00a0 The presence of Good.\u00a0 The pressure toward Good.<\/em><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0-The Rev. Dr. Robert Allan Hill, Dean.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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