Sermons for the Month
The Sounds of Silence
DATE: February 6, 2000
SERVICE: Epiphany V
TEXT: Mark 1:29-39“To all of you Saints here this morning, grace and peace to you from God our Father, from His Son, Jesus Christ and His Holy Spirit. AMEN
Paul Simon wrote a song copyrighted 1964 titled "The Sounds of Silence." It begins: "Hello darkness, my old friend I've come to talk to you again. Because a vision safely creeping Left its seed while I was sleeping And the vision that was planted in my brain Still remains Within the sounds of silence." We all have experienced the need to "get away" -- to be alone, to get in touch with the self. We all need that from time to time for rest, to recoup, to rethink, whatever. We live in a world where fanaticism where a Super Bowl party can spell death for the party goers or franticism, the frantic requirement to get it all done in one week-end are often the routine. When that happens to me I get into what I call a huddle with myself. I try to take some "time out" and hunker down and rethink by my priorities, to listen to the sounds of silence and the "vision" of not only who I am but whose I am. Our gospel text contains these words in Verse 35. "Very early the next morning, long before the daylight, Jesus got up and left the house. He went out of town to a lonely place, where he prayed." From the very beginning of his ministry, Jesus found it necessary to get away, sometimes in the darkness of the night, to say in touch with the vision of the kingdom that he came to announce. You may remember Jesus first words in the gospel of Mark, words we heard read just two weeks ago, "The time in right. The kingdom of God is at hand. Repent and believe." Unfortunately, it was not his announcement that captured people's attention; it was his healing powers. When word spread that he had the power to cast out demons -- the subject of Richard Israel's message last week -- the people surrounded him on all sides, pressing him to heal their maladies, exorcise their demons. "Everyone is looking for you" his disciples tell him. But the vision he wanted to plant in our brains was not that he was some kind of consumer oriented healing fix it man, but the vision of one kingdom led by God with freedom and love for all. Win Arn publishes a newsletter for the Institute for American Church Growth. He writes that for a church to live out its call to be the church needs to have minimally 15% of its adult members involved in outreach like home communion calls, calling on visitors, hunger programs, witness, and so forth to be considered average and 40% to be considered excellent. That means numerically for us we need at least 62 individuals with a goal of 162 members involved in outreach. I think you will agree that we are way above average but we still have room to grow. I can remember in middle school getting a C from the gym teacher, a C which kept me on the honor roll than six weeks grading period. I made an appointment with him and asked why he had given me a C and not at least a B. I told him I had everything everyone else had done--the sit-ups, the push-ups, the chin-ups. He said, "I know that but a C is for being average and you are an average boy aren't you?" Well, he had me there. There was no way that I could argue without appearing egotistical, "No sir. I am an above average boy!" I resolved that day to be more than just average. And I resolved to do one more push-up than was required, one more sit-up, and one more chin-up and to keep doing it until I was above average. Yet how often do we not settle for just being average? After all, there is so much to do, our preoccupations so persistent, our needs so pressing that we risk losing the Vision of our Mission. Jesus knew that too. And that is why he went off to pray, to get back in touch with that vision that gave him his purpose and direction, the vision to make disciples for His Father's kingdom. Jesus throughout his ministry right up to and including the very night he was taken into custody by the Temple Police would go off and pray that the vision that had been planted in his brain, still remained In the garden shortly before he was betrayed Jesus prayed, "If it be at all possible let this cup -- this vision of the kingdom --pass from me. Nevertheless, let not my will but thine be done." That vision was the sum and substance of who Jesus was--and is. That vision kept him on track. That vision gave him the strength to do what had to be done. That vision made him the salvation of the world. And that is the vision that informs us who we are. It is the sum and substance of what we are as a people of God are called to do. That is the vision is held up before us by such symbols as the Lamb over our organ and the cross over our altar. We are the people of the cross, the people of the lamb, the people of God called by God to make disciples of all nations. Let us pray: To be there before you, Lord, that's all To shut the eyes of my body, To shut the eyes of my soul, And be still and silent, To expose myself to you who are there, exposed to me. To be there before you, the Eternal Presence I am will to feel nothing, Lord, to see nothing, to hear nothing. Empty of all ideas, of all images, In the darkness I am here as I am To meet you without obstacles, In the silence of faith, Before you, Lord. But Lord I am not alone, I can no longer be alone. I am a crowd, Lord, For others live within me. I have met them, They have come in, They have settled down, They have worried me, They have tormented me, They have devoured me. And I have allowed it, Lord, that they might be nourished and refreshed. I bring them to you, too, as I come before you. I expose them to you in exposing myself to you. Her I am, Here they are Before you Lord. Let not my will but thine be done. AMEN