Matthew 5:14-16
The Voice
14 And you, beloved, are the light of the world. A city built on a hilltop cannot be hidden. 15 Similarly it would be silly to light a lamp and then hide it under a bowl. When someone lights a lamp, she puts it on a table or a desk or a chair, and the light illumines the entire house.16 You are like that illuminating light. Let your light shine everywhere you go, that you may illumine creation, so men and women everywhere may see your good actions, may see creation at its fullest, may see your devotion to Me, and may turn and praise your Father in heaven because of it.
Illumine Creation, Sermon May 25th 2014
Back in September I returned to school. I am currently enrolled in the Diaconal Ministry program with the Centre for Christian Studies. This school is located in Winnipeg MB, but most of the school work is done at home. Part of the school year is do what’s called a ‘field placement’ we don’t spend a lot of time in classrooms, rather this program has us working in the community getting experience through ‘doing’.
I was lucky because the school allowed me to do my field placement here at Mount Seymour where I am also employed. It made juggling ‘school work’ and ‘work work’ a lot easier.
As part of my field placement I began a Lectio Divina practice group here. Lectio Divina is a style of meditation that involves listening too and meditating on sacred words – usually scripture.
The passage from today’s reading was one of the first pieces of scripture our group used. In Lectio we listen for a word or phrase that stands out to us; a word that would be in Bold or colour when we image them in our heads.
The rest of the meditation time is spent praying about what the words mean in our hearts, how are we touched by the words and how can we take these sacred words into our day ahead.
For me, the words ‘illumine creation’ stood out at that first reading. They are beautiful to say – illumine creation.
These words and this passage have stuck with me throughout this past year as I worked on school and my job here and contemplated my discernment for ministry.
I’ve been in discernment for a very long time. I am pretty sure that my first conversation with Nancy about discernment was more than 4 years ago as I was working on my degree and she was curious about ‘what I would do with a theology degree once I was done’.
At the time I didn’t really know and I wasn’t sure I wanted to do anything more with it than have a fancy piece of paper for the wall. But I finished the degree and the paper the university sent me wasn’t fancy at all – in fact it was disappointingly boring, so what to do?
Another conversation with Nancy of course.
I remember this conversation as if it were yesterday, but it was close to three years ago now. We were discussing discernment again and I was resisting again. She asked me a question about what I wanted to do, what I enjoyed here at Mount Seymour.
I talked about leading Life Groups and the other small groups I’ve been involved with, I talked about how much I liked learning with people, listening to their stories and their ideas. How I liked helping out people one on one.
She said, ‘That sounds like diaconal.”
And I said, “huh?”
Diaconal?
Diaco-what? Diagonal? Huh?
Seriously, I’d never heard the word before and had no idea what she was talking about.
Which, I would soon learn is the response almost everyone else has when they hear the word diaconal.
Diaconal comes from the Greek work Diakonos – it means “to serve”.
It’s used in the Christian Scriptures by Paul to describe himself in, 1 Cor 3:5, and various other members of the church – mostly men and one woman named Pheobe in Romans 16: 1. He even uses it for Christ in Romans- 15:8. 2222
It’s where we also get the word Deacon from. In the United Church we have three options for ministry. Ordained Ministry – Nancy, Donna, Bethel are all ordained, or will be very shortly. There’s Designated Lay Ministry, and Diaconal Ministry.
What’s the difference? Depends on who you ask. Ordained ministers are ordained to do the sacraments – communion, weddings, baptisms. Diaconal’s are commissioned to often to the same things.
The biggest difference, in my mind, is our call. Diaconal’s are called to Educational Ministry, Pastoral Care and Social Justice. These are the three themes that the Diaconal program focuses on.
This isn’t to say that Ordained ministers aren’t called to these things, it’s just than most often people that go into diaconal ministry want to focus on those themes while ordained ministers tend to focus on worship and congregations.
This is true for me. When Nancy first mentioned this concept of being called – I freaked out. I was terrified of public speaking, I had no desire to stand up front and lead worship. Funny how things work out.
Yet, when I looked at what Diaconal ministers do, where their focus is I thought – yeah, that’s more my thing. Education, Justice, pastoral care. These are good things and things I like to do, working with the children, leading small groups, having spiritual practices.
But I still wasn’t sure I was ready to accept being ‘called’ by god to do anything. I wanted to be in-change of my life, my career and I certainly didn’t need Divine Intervention, thank you very much.
Two years ago, during lent, I spoke about my call during my first ever sermon. I spoke about Samuel from the Hebrew Scriptures. Samuel is a young boy, servant to Eli in the Temple in Jerusalem. One night he hears a voice calling his name, “Samuel, Samuel.” He thinks its Eli, calling to him, so he goes to Eli’s bedroom and asks, “What do you want?”
Eli says, “nothing, go back to bed”. So Samuel goes back to bed and again he hears the voice and again he goes to Eli who tells him he didn’t call and go back to bed. This happens a few times before Eli figures it out and tells Samuel that it’s God and when he hears the voice again, say ‘here I am.’ This is what Samuel does and he becomes a great prophet.
When I first reflected on this story I talked about how I was like Samuel. I heard this voice asking me to follow and I didn’t understand who or what it was. I talked about how it took a while for me to figure out what was going on and even longer to listen and say, “here I am”.
When I think about this story now I don’t think Samuel was all that ignorant about who was speaking. Actually I’m quite positive he knew exactly what was happening, but really, really wanted it to be Eli, not God calling him.
It’s scary. It’s very scary to think, to say out loud – I’m being called to something more than myself. And it’s as equally scary in today’s very secular world to say to the world – I’m called by God to do this work.
I don’t think that’s how it works when people decide to be lawyers or Doctors or teachers or massage therapists, does it? Maybe it does, but something tells me that even if you hear it in your head – you don’t say that at job interviews.
But, you know in this industry – it’s the coolest thing around. It’s not considered out thereto say you’ve been called – in fact it’s a necessary perquisite and you DO talk about it at job interviews.
So here’s the thing. I resisted. Like Samuel I pretended for quite awhile that I wasn’t hearing a call. I hummed and hawed and chose to follow my fear for a long time. Until, we read the Matthew 5 passage at Lectio Divina.
“You are like that illuminating light. Let your light shine everywhere you go, that you may illumine creation.”
I get shivers. My heart beats with excitement, not nervousness. I feel in my heart, in my gut that illuminating light wanting to burst free. I do not feel big enough to carry all of this light inside. I have to let it out, have to shine or else I might explode. Which would be messy.
And I know that is my call. My call is to try make sure that everything I do comes from a place of light. So that everything I do isn’t done from fear, but from light and love and goodness.
That’s a much easy call to accept, it doesn’t feel so big and overwhelming as a ‘call from god.’ Instead it is simple, gentle, a call to make decisions about my life from within my own inner light. When I make choices from that place, the light shines out like a candle on a table, like a city on a hill.
At school, in the diaconal program we talk a lot about authenticity, about being our authentic selves and how hard that can be sometimes when there is so much expected of us. Others have expectations and we put our own expectations on ourselves to be a certain way, to act a certain way, to live up to standards that maybe just aren’t for us.
When I do that do myself, I think – I’m a mom, I should dress like the other moms. I’m a wife, I should act or cook or clean a certain way. I work in ministry, I should definitelydress, act, be, do my hair a certain way. But these thoughts make me hide my light under a bowl.
So much of this year was about learning leadership skills for Education and Ministry, but so much more of it was learning about being myself and accepting myself for who I am and living with authenticity. Accepting who I am when I let my light shine everywhere I go.
Which can also be pretty scary. Especially when a lot of us spend our lives hiding our light, not wanting to stand out or be different.
I think Maryanne Williamson said it better than I could “Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness, that frightens us most. We ask ourselves, 'Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, and famous?' Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that people won't feel insecure around you. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It's not just in some of us; it's in all of us. And when we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.”
How can we resist that call? If we make one choice each day in our lives that lets our light shine, rather than hide it away we have followed God.
We’ve heard it said that Jesus called himself the light of the world. How awesome is it to hear the lines, “You beloved, are the light of the world.” That special kind of light that Jesus carried shines in all of us. We just need to let it out.
You are like that illuminating light. Let your light shine everywhere you go, that you may illumine creation.
Amen.
