Sermons for the Month
Your 60 Second Life
DATE: May 6, 2001
SERVICE: Easter IV
TEXT: Acts 9:36-43“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
The early church summed up the life of Dorcas quickly and succinctly with these words. They are all that we know of Dorcas also known as Tabitha. Acts 9: 36 Now in Joppa there was a disciple whose name was Tabitha, which in Greek is Dorcas. She was devoted to good works and acts of charity. 37 At that time she became ill and died. When they had washed her, they laid her in a room upstairs. 38 Since Lydda was near Joppa, the disciples, who heard that Peter was there, sent two men to him with the request, "Please come to us without delay." 39 So Peter got up and went with them; and when he arrived, they took him to the room upstairs. All the widows stood beside him, weeping and showing tunics and other clothing that Dorcas had made while she was with them. 40 Peter put all of them outside, and then he knelt down and prayed. He turned to the body and said, "Tabitha, get up." Then she opened her eyes, and seeing Peter, she sat up. 41 He gave her his hand and helped her up. Then calling the saints and widows, he showed her to be alive. 42 This became known throughout Joppa, and many believed in the Lord. (Acts 9:36-43) How would you reduce a life to a paragraph or two? What would you say? How would you succinctly sum up in a few lines the life of someone, someone you love, without getting overly explicit? To learn how, you may want to take lessons from Dan Hurley who does it rather routinely. It isn't just his jaunty yellow fedora, yellow silk butterfly bow tie, yellow blazer, two- tone saddle shoes and his button-down look that have won Dan Hurley media notice in USA Today, Wired, Reader's Digest, Fast Company, CNN.com and on National Public Radio's Morning Edition. Mr. Hurley made his name and his fame as a sidewalk performer. He's not a mime, or a juggler, or a folk singer, or a sax player. Mr. Hurley plays the keys - the old typewriter keys. Clickety-clack, ziiiiiiip, ding! He's a "performance writer." He's The 60-Second Novelist. He even has his own website. He's good and in demand with an enormous following from homeless street people to Hollywood's heavenly bodies to New York City's penthouse CEOs. Having once worked down in the streets, he's now moved uptown to working the parties where the elite meet. He'll chat you up, listen carefully and write it down. There you are in black ink on a white sheet with a carbon copy beneath for himself to keep. He'll write your story - poignant and true on one page - in under a minute. Then you'll be one of 20,000 he's written so far, including this one for Clement: ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- -----
I'm Really Satisfied With the Way I'm Living Now Not Happy Happy Just Content Clement is 40 years old and living in a dumpster. "It's shelter and I don't feel bad," says Clement. "It's four walls and a ceiling and a floor. The only thing it's missing is a kitchen and a bathroom." Clement says these last words with an impish smile. His unlined face seems younger, except for his graying beard. Clement has lived here in this dumpster, in a lot where dumpsters are stored at the corner of Bay and Court streets in Brooklyn, for a year and a half, since breaking up with his wife and discovering that he really didn't like the shelters. He's not a drug addict or an alcoholic. "The only vices I have are cigarettes and a little marijuana," he says. Clement makes his money as a "scrapper." He finds cans, bottles, semiprecious metals - anything he can turn in for cash. He also cleans out people's basements or whatever they want. Amazingly, he earns up to $800 or $900 a month and saves it in a bank account his sister keeps for him. He's not on welfare and won't beg, he says, mostly as a matter of pride. "I know I could do a whole lot better," Clement says. "But I'm content the way I'm living. Not happy happy. Just content." With ... the spirit of miracles and God's grace saving us - all of us, Christians and Jews and Muslims and nonbelievers alike, black and white and every other race, men and women, Park Avenue millionaires and welfare recipients in housing projects - may we all find the contentment in our own homes that Clement has found in his. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ---
We may disagree with his theology, but we can't argue that Mr. Hurley sums up an entire life - the depth and breadth of the character of a person - in few words. Sixty seconds isn't much time, but good stories don't have to take long to tell. Take Dorcas, for instance. The writer of her story didn't have a typewriter or a word processor, nor was he wearing yellow clothes from head top to shoe leather. It doesn't matter what the writer looks like. What matters is the story and the telling. Dorcas lived with sincerity, but we'd never know it except for the 94 words written about her. A short story it is, but what a story. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ---
What Dorcas Did. How She Lived, Died, Then Lived Again. Dorcas devotes her life to good works and charity. She does a lot for people and does it all the time. She sews cloth together, turning out tunics and other comfortable clothing that friends wear - and eye admiringly - because Dorcas, because DORCAS, stitches them. Who knows how to sew nowadays? Or knit? Or hook? Or bake? Or braid? Or give time for good works and acts of charity? Who takes the time? Dorcas does.
Her sewing makes her famous in Joppa, but her acts of kindness make her beloved. She is, like all of us - even if we don't humbly care to admit it - unique. And she is, to an extent - irreplaceable, indispensable. She does what others can't, or won't, do.
One day Dorcas gets sick and dies, leaving her community weeping and wondering - How are we going to replace Dorcas? Who can do what Dorcas did? Who can fill her spot among us?
"Peter!" they cry, "Dorcas is dead! Come save her! We need her!"
He comes. He prays. She lives again. Her good works and acts of charity continue. Her sewing continues, and the community survives intact. They don't even have to try to replace her - which might have proved impossible, because who could ever do the good works Dorcas does!?
The End. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ----
These days, it's fashionable to say and to believe that no one is indispensable. "You don't need me. You'll get along fine," anyone might say. Wrong. We are each uniquely gifted persons, particular creations of God, with a certain skill sets, certain abilities, certain aptitudes, and if we don't serve God, our families, our church or our communities in the way only WE can uniquely serve, then the job will not get done the way only we can do it. It will not get done the way our Creator intended. We are not carbon copies of each other. If Mr. Hurley were to write a 60-second novel for each of us, all our stories would be different, even if we all think we are pretty much similar. We may be similar, but we are not the same. Each story would be distinct because God has made each of us unique. We might think that each of us is replaceable but it isn't true. Think about it. Who could replace the love and caring of your own dear mother? Another mother? Any other mother? Who could replace your daughter? Any other girl? Who could preach like Paul or pray like Peter? Who might you get to replace me? Any other pastor? The early church could've survived without Dorcas just like you will survive without me. But don't say that her death wouldn't have made a difference. Don't say that Faith would be just no different if I hadn't been here. Don't say the church wouldn't have been weaker if you weren't a member. Don't say that just anyone could've done what Dorcas or I did or you do. Don't say anyone can serve the way you can serve. One person and one person's gifts can change the world, can change a community, can change a church. None of us are dispensable, not me, not you. Think about the one person who was present at the right moment when you most needed help, whose presence changed your life. Who could have replaced that one? Likely, no one. Think about yourself and the kind deeds you've done, known only to God. Who could have replaced you? No one! No one could have done them the way you did. The way God intended for you to do them. Does this sound like self-aggrandizement? I don't think so. It is merely stating the fact that each of us is unique. Each of you are the only you God will make. If you were not here, Faith would be the weaker. If it weren't for you we would not have accomplished what we have here. The point is when Faith begins looking for a new pastor, the task is not to find another Stan Sneeringer or Kathy Zbinden. You won't be able to do that. We were the appropriate persons for our time together. But now you have the opportunity to find those person appropriate for your next time. You won't find another me because you can't. There is no other me. And you shouldn't try. Your next pastor will need to be the person appropriate for your next time because your next time will not be the same as the time we had together. My time, our time together, will come to a close soon and the unique relationship we have enjoyed will give way to a new heaven and a new earth for you and Faith. If we could have Mr. Hurley write about us in 94 words or in 60 seconds, what would he say? Would he speak of a life that - had we not lived it together - others would have suffered? Would he speak of a life of love and devotion? Would he show us as unique? You bet he would! Listen to the story of Honest Abe by Dan Hurley, and judge for yourself if you, too, are unique and uniquely qualified to give and use your God-given gifts. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- --
"Honest Abe
Abe is honest. He's a man of his word. As a CPA, he had to be honest. People depended on him.
He was honest, too, when he promised to Margery 58 years ago that he would always love her and stand by her. They've been married that long, and they now have two children and three grandchildren. But he was never more honest than the day, six years ago, when his oldest daughter's husband, Fred, was in the hospital and Abe went to see him. You need a haircut," said Fred, joking. But Abe replied in utter seriousness: "I won't get a haircut until you walk out of here." Fred never did walk out of there. He was carried out. He died. And so Abe felt that he owed it to Fred to keep his word. That's why he has never cut his hair, why he has a long white ponytail - this conservative CPA. It is his white badge of honesty, devotion and love." ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Yes, its true. In a few short months I will no longer be your pastor. However, my prayer is that our lives will continue to be marked by the very same qualities, and our stories be told in the very same way as Dorcas, as Clement, as Honest Abe.
AMEN