{"id":3558,"date":"2023-10-15T11:00:23","date_gmt":"2023-10-15T15:00:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/sermons\/?p=3558"},"modified":"2023-10-18T15:44:44","modified_gmt":"2023-10-18T19:44:44","slug":"the-bach-experience-october-2023","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/sermons\/2023\/10\/15\/the-bach-experience-october-2023\/","title":{"rendered":"The Bach Experience, October 2023"},"content":{"rendered":"

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

Click here to watch the Bach lecture<\/a><\/p>\n

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

Matthew 22:1\u201310<\/a><\/p>\n

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

The Rev. Dr. Robert Allan Hill:<\/i><\/p>\n

We are living in and through a dark and difficult time, this fall.\u00a0\u00a0 Our climate shows significant signs, in our lived experience, of steady and worrisome warming.\u00a0 Our nation continues in the grip of deep divisions, and, of more concern, a palpable willingness on the part of some to jettison centuries of hard-won democracy for autocracy, and its false promise of \u2018escape from freedom\u2019, as Erik Fromm called it.\u00a0 Our culture languishes in the doldrums of a pervasive malaise, not unrelated to our fear of freedom, and its demands, and its rigors, and its openness to human flourishing.\u00a0 The dark night of warfare has fallen and stayed grounded into Europe, for a year and a half, with the fate of our Ukrainian sisters and brothers in the balance, with no end in sight.\u00a0 Now, in addition, we have the advent of a full blown catastrophic second war, perpetrated through terrorist violence, horrific and unspeakable violence, upon the people and traditions of Israel, which people and traditions our own Elie Wiesel over four decades here at Boston University did so much to illumine and honor, say: <\/span>\u201c<\/span>The opposite of love is not hate, it’s indifference. The opposite of art is not ugliness, it’s indifference. The opposite of faith is not heresy, it’s indifference. And the opposite of life is not death, it is indifference.\u201d<\/span><\/i>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

How we miss his voice, his presence, his warning and his wisdom today.\u00a0 Our youth and young adults, still wriggling free from years in the screen prisons of COVID, need and deserve and require expanded care and services related to personal, emotional and mental health, at a rate and with a range quite difficult for other generations fully to grasp.\u00a0 The challenges of poverty, of racism, of sexism, of inequality and injustice, of health care, of educational disparity, and the ever–present clouds of greed, malevolence, mendacity and despair continue to lap at the shores of our existential beaches, without pause and with ongoing wind strokes of pain.\u00a0 We are living through a dark and difficult time, this fall.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

While true for every season and age, it is acutely the case for our time that an honest, a necessarily honest admission of our condition should also and more so be soothed by, and challenged by, the promise of the <\/span>gospel,<\/span><\/i> and the prospect of <\/span>better days to come<\/span><\/i>.\u00a0 It is acutely the case for our time, for this very day, this day of rest and worship, this sabbath day, that a pause, a discreet hour of ordered worship, should be observed, and honored, including today by way of word and music both, the stringent candor of word and the soothing beautiful balm of music, together.\u00a0 The ordered public worship of Almighty God upon the Lord\u2019s Day is not a matter of indifference.\u00a0 It is a savingly crucial hour, that brings a ray of light into the dark, a note of promise into the silence, a reminder of joy into the pain, and a source of get up and go again power into the despond.\u00a0 It is thus fitting to hear the negativity of the last third of St. Matthew, including the harsh cold parable this morning, as a partnered honest admission of our own condition, the condition our condition is in.\u00a0 For Matthew cries out <\/span>over the rejection of invitation, the rejection of welcome, the rejection of love<\/span><\/i>.\u00a0 And he will not be consoled, like Rachel weeping for her children, and like Israeli mothers today weeping for their now soldier sons, no dishonest avoidance here.\u00a0 His parable matches our own angers.\u00a0 When things are not right, saith the Scripture, let us be honest that things are not right.\u00a0 And then let us turn and listen for the true, the good, and the beautiful.\u00a0 As in our cantata this morning.\u00a0 Dr Jarrett, what does this morning\u2019s Cantata bring us?<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Dr. Scott Allen Jarrett’s contribution to this sermon is not currently available.\u00a0<\/i><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The Rev. Dr. Robert Allan Hill:<\/i><\/p>\n

Presence in an ordered service of divine worship, your presence here today for instance, is one sign of trust that in this life we are being addressed from beyond.\u00a0 Your presence this morning is an indication, a witness if you will, to your intimation or confidence or something in between, that you are \u2018hearing voices\u2019, that you are called, spoken to, addressed.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The parable of the wedding banquet, retold in Matthew from a kinder Lukan version, rests on this conviction of a divine beckoning and calling.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

I think we seldom recognize what a powerful thing an invitation can be.\u00a0 Pause and recall a time or two when you were savingly invited.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

We know the power of an invitation when we hungrily receive one heartily desired.\u00a0 Nothing in all the world ever happened between persons without invitations.\u00a0 Every sermon is in some way an invitation to you, to take a step in faith, to take a step, one step, in faith.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

That is, you receive today, again, a personal invitation.\u00a0 The invitation is meant for you, sent to you, an event for you.\u00a0 You are invited to attend the wedding of heaven and earth! to lead a godly life! to lead a life worthy of God! to live in faith and by a conviction, which is a trust, faith is a personal commitment to an unverifiable truth.! If we had all proof we want we would not have all the faith we need.\u00a0 Will you come to the banquet?\u00a0 Will you take a step in faith?<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The voice of invitation is an enticement, a coaxing, a luring, a courting.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

President Biden this week offered such an invitation, a biblical one, tucked into perhaps the greatest speech thus far in his administration, saying: <\/span>This is a moment for the United States to come together, to grieve with those who are mourning.\u202f<\/span><\/i>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

You remember that our gospel writer for today,\u00a0 St Matthew, the Evangelist, has a passion.\u00a0 It is invitation.\u00a0 The point of the Gospel of Mathew the Evangelist is that he is an evangelist.\u00a0 This is his love.\u00a0 His first love.\u00a0 To seek the lost, to hug the lonely.\u00a0 And it is a passionate love.\u00a0 I can see your passions, in architecture, history, homily, mission, symbol, country, group\u2014these inspire passion. As, especially, does music. Matthew offers the gift, divinely wrapped, of his passion:\u00a0 sharing an invitation, perhaps a first encounter with Christ for those <\/span>c\u2019est vouz?, <\/span><\/i>who do not know a single verse, cannot recite a single psalm, cannot describe baptism and communion, do not a favorite hymn, and have no lived experience of church committee meetings.\u00a0 This is the great joy of faith, to share it.\u00a0 Do so. You only have what you can give away.<\/span> \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

-Dr. Scott Allen Jarrett, Director of Music<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Click here to hear the full service Click here to watch the Bach lecture Click here to watch the full service Matthew 22:1\u201310 Click here to hear just the sermon and cantata The Rev. Dr. Robert Allan Hill: We are living in and through a dark and difficult time, this fall.\u00a0\u00a0 Our climate shows significant […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2679,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[25,36,22],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3558"}],"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=3558"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3558\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3561,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3558\/revisions\/3561"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3558"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3558"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3558"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}