Rev. Tara Barber
The Community Church of Sebastopol
December 12, 2004
Luke 1: 39-56
In the play, Our Town, Emily who has died in childbirth wishes to return home to relive just a day. The stage manager grants her request and she goes back to her hometown... She sees, as no one else among the living can, incredible beauty in ordinary things. Yet she grieves that no one is aware of these wonderful moments in life. She cries out to her mother, "Mama, just look at me one moment as though you really saw me . . . it goes so fast we don't have time to look at one another." And then she goes back to the graveyard and to the quiet company of the others lying there and asks the Stage Manager, "Do any human beings ever realize life while they live it?" And he sighs and says, " No, except maybe the saints and poets. They do some…”
One of the saddest comments I’ve heard over the past few weeks is the sentiment that folks were just beginning to get to know me, and now I’m leaving. People come in and out of our lives everyday. And often we don’t know until it’s too late that we’ve missed our chance to make a connection, deepen a relationship, or to mend a fence – to make a difference.
Ann Wells, a colleague in ministry writes: “My brother-in-law opened the bottom drawer of my sister's bureau and lifted out a tissue-wrapped package.
‘This,' he said, ‘is not a slip. This is lingerie.'
He discarded the tissue and handed me the slip. It was exquisite: silk, handmade and trimmed with a cobweb of lace. The price tag with an astronomical figure on it was still attached.
'Jan bought this the first time we went to New York, at least eight or nine years ago. She never wore it. She was saving it for a special occasion. Well, I guess this is the occasion.'
He took the slip from me and put it on the bed with the other clothes we were taking to the mortician. His hands lingered on the soft material for a moment, then he slammed the drawer shut and turned to me.
‘Don't wait. Don’t ever save anything for a special occasion. Every day you're alive is a special occasion.'
I remembered those words through the funeral and the days that followed when I helped him and my niece attend to all the sad chores that follow an unexpected death. I thought about them on the plane returning to California from the midwestern town where my sister's family lives. I thought about all the things that she hadn't seen or heard or done. I thought about the things she had done without realizing that they were special. I'm still thinking about his words, and they've changed my life. I'm reading more and dusting less (something that has never been a problem for me.) I'm sitting on the deck and admiring the view without fussing about the weeds in the garden… I can do that one too, I guess… I'm spending time with my family and friends and less time in committee meetings. Whenever possible, life should be a pattern of experience to savor, not endure.
I'm trying to recognize those moments now and cherish them. I'm not ‘saving' anything; we use our good china and crystal for every special event - such as losing a pound, getting the sink unstopped, the first camellia blossom…
‘Someday' and ‘one of these days' are losing their grip on my vocabulary. If it's worth seeing or hearing or doing, I want to see and hear and do it now. I'm not sure what my sister would have done had she known that she wouldn't be here for the tomorrow we all take for granted. I think she would have called family members and a few close friends. She might have called a few former friends to apologize and mend fences for past squabbles. I like to think she would have gone out for a Chinese dinner, her favorite food. But I'm guessing - I'll never know.
It's those little things left undone that would make me angry if I knew that my hours were limited. Angry because I put off seeing good friends whom I was going to get in touch with - some day. Angry because I hadn't written certain letters that I intended to write - one of these days. Angry and sorry that I didn't tell my family often enough how much I truly love them.
I'm trying very hard not to put off, hold back, or save anything that would add laughter and luster to our lives. And every morning when I open my eyes, I tell myself that it is special. Every day, every minute, every breath truly is . . . a gift from God.” Don’t wait.
I’ve been listening to the musical genius of the Christian rock group, Switchfoot, thanks to Tami Blackstone. Their music gives me hope, not only for Christianity, but also for the direction that young people are taking the faith. Their words have been ringing in my ears. They sing: “Today is all you’ve got now, and today is all you’ll ever have. Don’t close your eyes, don’t close your eyes. This is your life, are you who you want to be? This is your life, are you who you want to be?”
Advent is traditionally described as the season of waiting, of anticipation. Calendars help us count down, advertisements remind us of how many shopping days remain until Christmas. We’re told to get ready because Christmas is coming! And then we stumble across Mary’s magnificat. Mary’s prayer of gratitude and hope. As the story goes, Mary sings her prayer while visiting her pregnant cousin. Mary was giving thanks before her baby was even born. God was moving in and through her, gifting her with a great vision and promise. And you and I have been gifted as well. Only most of us don’t have the reason to wait that Mary did.
Susan B Anthony didn’t live to see the 19th Amendment pass. Moses never made it to the Promised Land. Mary’s vision certainly didn’t come true in her lifetime. So why bother?
On Monday night, Marianne Williamson spoke here and she reminded us of Gandhi’s saying that we must be the change we wish to see in the world. She says, “I’m not telling you this just so that your walk and your talk match, I’m telling you this because Gandhi believed that we must be the change, or the change isn’t going to happen.”
At the end of Marianne Williamson’s talk, she invited folks to ask questions. One man spoke and said something along the lines that in Sebastopol, we are much better than in other parts of the country. We’re more progressive, we’re more inclusive, and we don’t have the problems that other people and other places have. So, now what do we do here in Sonoma county, since our work is done? Marianne responded to him that she guessed that there were people in Sebastopol for whom life isn’t going so well. She guessed that there is still work to do here.
Maybe life is better here than in many places. Maybe it’s easy to overlook some of the ugliness, or maybe we just feel a bit paralyzed when we think about how far our lives and our communities are from God’s kingdom.
And again, Switchfoot’s lyrics come back to me singing, “We were meant to live for so much more, have we lost ourselves?”
Author and teacher Danusha Goska shares this memory: She was sitting in a symposium on spirituality and ecology where one person stood up and spoke about feeling paralyzed and powerless. Danusha practically exploded at the comment. You see, she had been living with a disease, that when it flared up, left her literally paralyzed, unable to even walk across the room. She addressed the symposium, saying, “That paralysis has taught me something. It has taught me that my protestations of my own powerlessness are bogus. Yes, some days I can’t move or see. But you know what? Some days I can….” She goes on to talk about walking home from campus along the railroad tracks, where turtles have gotten stuck, and picking them up, one by one, and carrying them back into the woods. It’s a similar story to the one about the starfish, dying on the dry beach. She says, “For those turtles, the power I have is enough.” She concluded by talking about a snowy day when her illness suddenly came over her as she was walking home. She was struggling with each step, and wobbling, looking more drunk than ill. A neighbor whom she had never met stopped and offered her a ride home. She says, “I’d lived in the neighborhood for years, and so far he has been the only one to stop. The problem is not that we have so little power. The problem is that we don’t use the power we have.”
And Marianne Williamson’s powerful words come back to me. “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 most frightens us. We ask ourselves, who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are we not to be? We are a child of God. Our playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightening about shrinking so that other people won’t feel unsure around us. We are born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. The glory of God is not just in some of us; it is in all of us. As we let our 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.”
If you know me a little, you know that I like “take homes.” And if you know me a little bit better, you know that I have a few candles. And so I would like to share my candles with you that you can them home and light them and be reminded that the light in you is so much more powerful than any darkness you can encounter. I have some for everyone, some have been burned, and some went all the way to North Carolina, to Cleveland… I don’t think there are any left from Seattle. Some are brand new, some are butterflies and some are tea light and some have stars.
I want to conclude with these words: You are the light of the world. And I invite you to believe that. Believe in Joy. Believe in Love. Believe in God’s transforming power that brings light into the darkness, hope out of despair, new life from what was dead, forgotten. This is your life…are you who you want to be? This is your life, are you everything God dreams that you to be? What are you waiting for? Today is all you’ve got now. So go for it. Be the one God imagines you to be. For blessed are you among all humanity. You were born to manifest the glory of God. Let your light shine for this community, for this country, for this world to see.