{"id":3481,"date":"2023-04-09T11:00:56","date_gmt":"2023-04-09T15:00:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/sermons\/?p=3481"},"modified":"2023-04-19T10:19:24","modified_gmt":"2023-04-19T14:19:24","slug":"let-the-glory-out-easter-2023","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/sermons\/2023\/04\/09\/let-the-glory-out-easter-2023\/","title":{"rendered":"Let the Glory Out- Easter 2023"},"content":{"rendered":"

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

Matthew 28:1\u201310<\/a><\/p>\n

Click here to hear just the sermon<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

Defeat may serve as well as victory<\/em>
\nTo shake the soul and let the glory out. (E Markham).<\/em><\/p>\n

Holy Week Poem<\/b><\/p>\n

After the falsehood of Palm Sunday.\u00a0 After the shadows of Tenebrae.\u00a0 After the betrayal of Maundy Thursday.\u00a0 After the torture of Good Friday.\u00a0 After the silence, the emptiness, of Easter Vigil.\u00a0 Now.\u00a0 Come Sunday.\u00a0 Come Easter Sunday\u2026The Lord is Risen!\u00a0 He is risen indeed.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

But let us take care in our comprehension of our intention of our inspiration for our consideration of our inclination toward our apprehension of resurrection.\u00a0 On this glorious day.\u00a0 The resurrection follows but does not replace the cross.\u00a0 As the poet wrote:\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

\u2026Defeat may serve as well as victory, to shake the soul and let the glory out\u2026\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

My predecessor Dean Robert Cummings Neville, who preached beautifully last evening and is with us this morning, bequeathed me in 2006 the former desk of the former\u2014fourth\u2014President of Boston University, Daniel Marsh, now the desk for the Dean of Marsh Chapel.\u00a0 Rectangular, 4\u2019by 2\u2019, the desk has only two drawers, one filled with hand written notes of thanks, encouragement, rejoinder, critique and love; the other one filled with a potpourri of desk type things\u2014pen, calculator, tape, scissors, all.\u00a0 In the back corner are pocket sized books.\u00a0\u00a0 I was flying to meet our son for his birthday, an annual mid-winter joy, and wanted a very small gift for him, meaningful but fit for flying without adding to him a burden going home.\u00a0 Somehow President Marsh\u2019s desk beckoned. In the back corner I found an old pocket collection of prayers and poems, which had been my dad\u2019s during his early days as a military chaplain, given to him in 1958 by the Methodist minister in Denver Colorado.\u00a0 It seemed perfect for our son\u2019s birthday, and portable, and a further connection to his grandfather.\u00a0 And a kind of binding of the generations, which becomes more important, as the years progress.<\/p>\n

Looking through the book, on route to our birthday celebration, I was startled by a poem by Edward Markham.\u00a0 Memory does not afford how, originally, I came to know the poem.\u00a0 Markham was a faithful social activist, poet laureate of Oregon, who died in 1940, and best known for his social gospel poem, The Man with the Hoe.\u00a0 But this prayer book poem, short and terse, somehow brought clouded memory, somehow past connection:<\/p>\n

Defeat may serve as well as victory
\nTo shake the soul and let the glory out\u2026
\nOnly the soul that knows the mighty grief
\nCan know the mighty rapture,
\nSorrows come
\nTo stretch out spaces in the heart for joy.<\/p>\n

Easter is the victorious faith to live on, to struggle on, in the aftermath of defeat.\u00a0 It is the music lesson that teaches you to sing the Lord\u2019s song in a foreign land.\u00a0 So, our exiled Jewish forebears wept, but remembered, cried aloud, but stayed true, gave gruesome lament, but still, but yet, held on, with the faith and power together to live with and through defeat:<\/p>\n

By the rivers of Babylon\u2014
\nthere we sat down, and there we wept\u2026
\nwhen we remembered Zion.
\nand our tormentors asked for mirth, saying,
\n\u201cSing us one of the songs of Zion!\u201d
\nHow could we sing the Lord\u2019s song
\nin a foreign land?<\/p>\n

Hear Good News!<\/p>\n

God shows no partiality, but in every nation anyone who fears him and does what is right is acceptable to him.<\/p>\n

Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good; his mercy endures forever.<\/p>\n

If you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God.<\/p>\n

(Fear not for I know that you seek Jesus who was crucified.\u00a0 He is not here.\u00a0 He is risen as he said.)<\/p>\n

\u201cOne Easter I went with my grandfather to a small Presbyterian church in northern Idaho where I heard a sermon on the discrepancies in the gospel accounts of the resurrection\u2026I was a young child\u2026 yet I remember that sermon\u2026I can imagine myself that primal Easter, restive at my grandfather\u2019s elbow, pushing my nickels and dimes of collection money into the tips of my gloves\u2026memorably forbidden to remove my hat\u2026It seems to me I felt God as a presence before I had a name for him\u2026I was aware to the point of alarm of a vast energy of intention all around me\u2026and I thought everyone else must also be aware of it\u2026Only in church did I hear experience like mine acknowledged, in all those strange narratives, read and expounded\u2026\u201d(The Death of Adam, 227-229, Marilynne Robinson)<\/p>\n

From mid-March on, the Markham poem haunted.\u00a0 And as Holy Week approached, more so still.\u00a0 More so this week.\u00a0 After\u2026the falsehood of Palm Sunday.\u00a0 After the shadows of Tenebrae.\u00a0 After the betrayal of Maundy Thursday.\u00a0 After the torture of Good Friday.\u00a0 After the silence, the emptiness, of Holy Saturday.\u00a0 Now.<\/p>\n

I believe in the resurrection, both its history and its mystery.\u00a0 But to convey its power as well as its meaning, the church has been trying to do for 2,000 years, come Easter, come Sunday.\u00a0 Resurrection is resurrection\u2026of the dead, from the dead.\u00a0 Yet, the reality of death in all its masks never, ever leaves us, and should not be left at the door come Easter, for the sake of the preaching of the resurrection itself.\u00a0 The resurrection follows but\u2026does not replace\u2026the cross.\u00a0 Defeat may serve as well as victory, to shake the soul, and let the glory out.<\/p>\n

Maybe that is particularly stunning and gracious news for a culture that bows the knees at victory, even when the facts show defeat.<\/p>\n

Betrayal, disrespect, ingratitude\u2026these things are real and are not washed away, not even at Easter.\u00a0 Sin, death, meaninglessness\u2026these things are lasting and are not erased not even at Easter.<\/p>\n

To repeat: Easter is not mere victory.\u00a0 Easter is the victorious power to live with defeat.\u00a0 Easter is not mere victory.\u00a0 Easter is the victorious faith to live on, to struggle on, in the aftermath of defeat.\u00a0 Easter is the music lesson that teaches us to sing the Lord\u2019s song in a foreign land.<\/p>\n

Your mother said, \u2018when life gives lemons, make lemonade\u2019.\u00a0 She did not mean that lemons are sweet.\u00a0 They aren\u2019t.<\/p>\n

When Martin Neimoller cried out\u2026 First they came for the Socialists, and I did not speak out\u2014Because I was not a Socialist.\u00a0 Then they came for the Trade Unionists, and I did not speak out\u2014Because I was not a Trade Unionist. Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out\u2014Because I was not a Jew. Then they came for me\u2014and there was no one left to speak for me\u2026his cry was an honest lament of faithlessness, of utter defeat, amid a faithful call to justice.\u00a0 He did not thereby claim that injustice had ended, or would.\u00a0 It abides.<\/p>\n

Robert F. Kennedy stood in the rain in Indianapolis, 55 years ago, to speak with tragic honesty about the murder of Martin Luther King: My favorite poet was Aeschylus. He wrote: “In our sleep, pain which cannot forget falls drop by drop upon the heart until, in our own despair, against our will, comes wisdom through the awful grace of God.”\u00a0 He did not forecast the coming of the kingdom in short order.\u00a0 And it did not come, and King\u2019s death presaged his own two months later.<\/p>\n

John Fetterman of Pennsylvania checked himself into the hospital this winter for depression, and is returning to life.\u00a0 He does not thereby deny the horrid anxiety and loneliness of despond. It remains.\u00a0 Anxiety and depression and alienation and disconnection remain, and must be battled in resurrection spirit.<\/p>\n

Strangely, after days, the memory of where we may first have heard the poem, or a snippet of it, emerged.\u00a0 From December 2000. Al Gore indirectly cited Markham\u2019s poem 23 years ago after the drama of dangling chads and the 566-vote loss of the Presidency in 2000, mentioning that his own father had often cited it.\u00a0 That must have been part of my dim memory of the verse. He did not deny the hurt in defeat.\u00a0 He had the greater motive:\u00a0 to sense in defeat a portal to glory, and in his case it came, over time, in his work, early work, even early prophetic work, on climate.\u00a0 In the winter of 2008, along with Professor Peter Berger, of blessed memory, Marsh Chapel hosted a screening of Gore\u2019s film, An Inconvenient Truth.\u00a0 He did not mean that political dishonesty had ended.\u00a0 It hadn\u2019t.<\/p>\n

We have all known defeats, whether in relationship, in illness, in acceptances, in elections, in selections, in trusts, in, well, in life.\u00a0 Yet they have a far side beyond all the trouble.\u00a0 After one defeat, with grace and love, a mentor sent a note saying, \u2018You were not denied\u2026you were spared.\u00a0 Not denied but spared\u2019.<\/p>\n

And yet, in all these moments, for all their trial, there was\u2026what shall we call it? Call it resurrection.<\/p>\n

Easter is the unkillable possibility of the Christian life, the power and empowerment of authentic human life, the un-maskable potential in every space and every place, for love.\u00a0 Easter is the resurrection of possibility.<\/p>\n

In a strange resurrection way, those who have given us our greatest blessings, our lasting victories, have done so knowing in full the lasting sting of defeat, in our own past.<\/p>\n

Those who gave us Boston University in 1839.<\/p>\n

Those who gave us the Chautauqua movement in the 1870\u2019s.<\/p>\n

Those who gave up the names and properties of their own denominations in Canada to forge with others the United Church there in 1925.<\/p>\n

Those who gathered the bruised and beaten religious survivors of World War II, and created the World Council of Churches in 1948.<\/p>\n

Those who kindled the student movement of the 1950\u2019s.<\/p>\n

Those who welcomed the globe into the \u2018aggiornamento\u2019 of Vatican II in 1963.<\/p>\n

Their faithfulness in and through suffering gave life, to many, and to you and me.\u00a0 Without those five movements we would not be here today, not in this shape anyway.<\/p>\n

One friend brought an Easter memory this week:<\/p>\n

\u201cAs I conducted the Good Friday Communion Service in (one) stark setting, I always noticed that the scent of the Easter lilies (always delivered Friday morning) drifted across the hallway into the sanctuary. What marvelous symbolism! While looking at the veiled cross and stark communion table, worshippers could not avoid breathing in a sweet reminder of Our Lord\u2019s victory over tragedy and death.<\/p>\n

Over the years, I have been privileged to know a good many people who have been able to sense Easter during the Good Friday\u2019s of their lives, and were therefore enabled to move through dark days with dignity and hope. Thank God for the scent of Easter!\u201d (The Rev. Gordon Knapp).<\/p>\n

Sursum Corda! Hear the Easter Gospel! \u2018Defeat may serve as well as victory<\/p>\n

To shake the soul, and let the glory out\u2019!<\/p>\n

In the words of the Canadian Creed:<\/p>\n

We believe in God:
\nwho has created and is creating,
\nwho has come in Jesus,
\nthe Word made flesh,
\nto reconcile and make new,
\nwho works in us and others
\nby the Spirit.<\/p>\n

We trust in God.<\/p>\n

We are called to be the Church:
\nto celebrate God\u2019s presence,
\nto live with respect in Creation,
\nto love and serve others,
\nto seek justice and resist evil,
\nto proclaim Jesus, crucified and risen,
\nour judge and our hope.<\/p>\n

In life, in death, in life beyond death,
\nGod is with us.
\nWe are not alone.<\/p>\n

Thanks be to God.<\/p>\n

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

Click here to hear the full service Matthew 28:1\u201310 Click here to hear just the sermon Defeat may serve as well as victory To shake the soul and let the glory out. (E Markham). Holy Week Poem After the falsehood of Palm Sunday.\u00a0 After the shadows of Tenebrae.\u00a0 After the betrayal of Maundy Thursday.\u00a0 After […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2679,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[61,22],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3481"}],"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=3481"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3481\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3482,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3481\/revisions\/3482"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3481"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3481"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3481"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}