As you know, I recently returned from Italy on pilgrimage with 27 parishioners. We started in Monte Cassino where Saint Benedict founded his monastery in the 6th century; and finished in Assisi where Saint Francis, in the 13th century, started a monastery of his own.
Both Benedict and Francis had rules of life. They were similar in their essence: poverty, chastity, and obedience. The Benedictines directed the energy gained from their rule toward worship and hospitality. The Franciscans directed it toward serving the poor. And the world is better for them both.
I found myself wondering on this pilgrimage what a rule of life might look like for you and me. Poverty, chastity and obedience don’t quite seem to fit the bill… knowing you as I do.
So, I reflected on people who have had significant impact on our community over the years, and what patterns of life they represented; what posture they held; what actions they took; and what resources they employed. And three words came to mind: kindness, helpfulness, and generosity. This trifecta seemed a good foundation upon which to consider a rule of life.
And so, I begin with a posture of kindness; where kindness is the intention we lead with; where kindness is the coat we wear, irrespective of the temperature outside. Where kindness is our posture as we approach whatever situation we find ourselves going toward.
And when we arrived the question is always the same: How can I be helpful? That is the action for the rule: helpfulness. Imagine if everybody in the world arrived at the place they were going with the goal of being helpful?
Mostly when we arrive somewhere, we arrive to get something done, or to have something done on our behalf.
I want to shift from that way of being, at least in my own life… so, maybe this sermon is just for me. Thanks for listening in. And so, the rule might begin with a posture of kindness; lead to an action of helpfulness; and finally, have impact through the orientation of generosity. That is the third part of the rule: generosity, where we bring the full weight of our capacity to whatever situation we find ourselves in.
And so there is kindness – the posture. There is helpfulness – the action. There is generosity – the capacity we bring to bear.
Which brings me to the final aspect of this rule, or maybe I should say the first aspect of this rule, or maybe even the glue that holds this rule together – faithfulness. And that is what I want to focus on today – faithfulness.
And so, I scanned the history of Epiphany for faithfulness and found Charley Bush. You may remember him. He died 13 years ago, and he was kind, helpful, and generous.
Charley was an institutional character, deeply involved with the choir, and service and outreach, and every other aspect of the parish. He was faithful even when things here weren’t easy. Charley was present, every Sunday, faithfully.
Then he got cancer and eventually died from it, but it took some time and along the way, what I witnessed was kindness, helpfulness, and generosity. When people have cancer it seems that their work becomes the battle, much of which takes place in hospitals. Charley spent a lot of time in the hospital and that’s where I witnessed him employ the Epiphany rule of life. He was kind to the people he met. He asked the nurses and attendants and people in the chemo department how they were. He got to know them. He made friends.
And while that wasn’t necessarily helpful in putting needles in arms, or changing beds, or turning patients over; being kind to the people who served him was helpful, and, I might add generous, given what he was going through.
And I imagine to this day, many in the hall of Virginia Mason have a memory of Charley Bush as kind, helpful, generous And, as I am sure they found out, infused with a faithfulness to Jesus; because Charley was a Jesus guy.
And here’s the wonderful thing about this faithfulness, it finds its source in the very earliest moments of Christianity.
Faithfulness was carved into the very architecture of Rome. Church after church, ancient basilicas and small parish sanctuaries, called out this same faithfulness, and more so, even to the extreme.
Because the thing that gave the early church its dynamism and its growth, the thing that made Christianity the most significant movement to have ever existed on this earth, was the deep faithfulness of Jesus people.
Jesus was their guy. No matter what. And when I say no matter what, I mean no matter what.
Look up at the reredos behind the altar. You will see twelve shields. Each tells a story. Paul, who took the Gospel to Rome, was beheaded there. Jude was martyred in Persia with an axe alongside Simon the Zealot. Philip was crucified upside down in Asia Minor. Andrew was crucified on an X-shaped cross, a saltire. James the Lesser was thrown from the Temple wall in Jerusalem, then beaten to death. Bartholomew was skinned alive in Armenia. Matthew was stabbed to death while celebrating the Eucharist in Ethiopia. Thomas was killed with a spear while at prayer in Madras, India. Peter, the rock, was crucified upside down in Rome. James the Greater, the first martyred, beheaded in Jerusalem by Herod Agrippa. Only John, they say, died of old age. But not without incident: the snake in the chalice represents how someone tried to poison him at church.
Eleven of twelve died for their faithfulness.
Now, martyrdom is not heroism. Martyrdom is not perfectionism, or spiritual purity. Martyrdom is, in fact at its root, an accident, where a person of power demands faithfulness over faithfulness to Jesus; and the martyrs simply said NO. Not that they are out to topple the person in power. Not that they want to take away what someone else has. Not that they want to die. They are simply not going to put anything ahead of Jesus. NOTHING.
That simple act of faithfulness turned the Roman Empire inside-out. The most powerful empire, the most powerful men to ever walk the earth, became Christians because they couldn’t outrank Jesus. Faithfulness prevailed.
Today we have baptisms. And what you and I are promising to these candidates, what we are modeling for these people, what we are inviting them into is a life of faithfulness to Jesus.
And while that might not make us perfect; while that might not get us out from under suffering, like the suffering Charley Bush experienced; it will reveal to us a life of joy irrespective of the circumstances that swirl around us – because true joy looks a lot like kindness and helpfulness and generosity.
Look back at those shields. Every one of those men allowed no space between himself and Jesus. Not because they were looking for trouble. Not because they were trying to change the political order of their world. Or had a death wish. They simply refused to place anything above their relationship with Jesus. And that refusal, that faithfulness, that single, stubborn, daily act of showing up for God, changed the world more thoroughly than any army, any empire, any election.
Not everyone becomes a martyr; not everything ends in blood. But everything does end. And what we find at the end of our own stories, is that the only relationship we can be fully assured of, the only one that does not diminish or disappear or betray us or simply run out of time, is our relationship with Jesus.
That is the enduring one. That is the one worth being faithful to – first and foremost. And it turns out that when we are, when we show up for God day after day, in the small ways and the large ones, in chemo waiting rooms, and on airplanes, and at the office, and across the dinner table – it changes things.
Charley Bush changed things. The apostles changed things. Not because they were extraordinary, but because they were faithful. And we can be as well.
You showed up today on Sunday. In Seattle that says something about where Jesus is in your life; it says something about faithfulness, and maybe, even, what it means to follow an Epiphany rule of life.