Sermon

Be the Light

by The Rev. Carol Sanford

Good morning. In case you hadn’t noticed, it is cold out there! I suppose it’s to be expected, we are in deep midwinter, snow on snow on snow... But one thing is unmistakable: the light is coming back. It is no longer dark at 4:30 in the afternoon, and the morning sun, when we can see it, is coming through in a most encouraging way. And, not coincidentally, here we are, in this season following the Epiphany, putting on our spring green and continuing to hear about light, glorious light.

More than once I have read comments from people who think that the correlation of the Christian calendar with astronomical or agricultural cycles somehow proves that we are either dishonest or delusional. I beg to disagree. I find it magnificent that we celebrate the Nativity near the time of the winter solstice, and Easter near the bursting forth of spring.

Here in Kansas City we are lucky to live in the northern hemisphere where the liturgical calendar lines up in perfect symbolism with the seasons of the year, and so we are speaking of the light of Christ being born and spreading throughout the world just as our days are beginning to lengthen and brighten. It might be more challenging to preach this sermon in, say, Argentina, where the daylight hours are now waning.

Then again, folks in parts of the globe that are beginning to journey toward winter may be less easily confused about what sort of light we are talking about. This season following the Epiphany, for Christians everywhere, is about Light with a capital ‘L’. This Light is greater than the sun, moon and stars put together, greater even than the primordial light surging into creation on the first day. This capital-L-Light of God scatters not the valuable physical darkness, but the opaque shroudings of sin and fear and even of death itself.

Jesus, One with the Father and the Holy Spirit, is this very Light of the world, and yet what does he do at the outset of his public ministry? He does not wave a magic wand or set up a throne or join in a war. He doesn’t send down lightening bolts or establish universities or political structures. Instead, Jesus goes out along a rocky shoreline and gets a few fishermen to leave their work and come with him. This sounds almost as crazy as God showing up as a baby in a barn. But maybe, just maybe, God knows what God is doing.

In my childhood home, there was a cherished photo of my father, caught mid-air above a snowy landscape, as he soared off a ski jump. This had been an important part of my dad’s college life so, despite living in southern Missouri, I grew up knowing some of the terms and conditions of snow skiing, although I had never actually seen a pair of skis. When I was about thirteen, my family set out on a big winter vacation to the Rocky Mountains, and I came to understand something of my father’s enthusiasm the first time I made my hesitant way down a slope.

It took some time, but with teachers and fellow learners who showed me how to use the equipment and encouraged me in my awkward beginnings and helped me up and laughed with me when I fell, I began to follow my father’s paths down the mountains.

Although I never jumped and was ultimately more a fan of chili by the fire than of those icy slopes, I did learn about perseverance and practice, and about how sometimes crashing, rolling, cold and painful failure leads on into gliding, swooping, surprising joy. I would never have known the freedom of an open run had I only looked at the pictures or listened to the stories or insisted on going it alone.

This concept applies to everything we hear about in this place, including the experiences of faith, forgiveness, compassion, prayer, communion, trust in God and service to others, just to name a few of our basics.

Perhaps Jesus gathers up Simon Peter and Andrew and James and John because they will learn to carry the Light of God by direct exposure and personal experience. Jesus is the Light of the world, and he sets about bringing the good news of God’s kingdom for all people by living and working directly with just a few of them. It is our job now to carry the Light of Christ. What if we were to do something like what Jesus did?

One starting point might be to think about where and how we have experienced this Light shining in our own lives. I’ll give you a couple of hints: think about what others have done for you, then think about what you have done for others. I’m going to assume, because this is how we seem to have been created, that the true light of Christ happens for you in both the offering and in the receiving, much the same way that we experience Holy Eucharist. We offer what we have received, we receive it back transformed, and in receiving, we are prepared to give and in giving we receive and so we offer and so it goes.

That was the theology; here are some suggestions for practical application and, remember, like the skiing, we won’t really get it until we give it a try: Attend Café Grazia this week. Hit one of the Cathedral Bible studies. Try praying the short morning devotion from the Prayer Book for the next week or two. (That’s on page 137.  Or here, if you'd like to bookmark it for easy browsing.) Sign up for the women’s retreat, volunteer at the library or animal shelter or at the Kansas City Community Kitchen. Talk to someone you don’t know very well at coffee hour. Any of these can feel awkward, so you can always blame me and say, this feels silly, but one of our priests says we have to.

One final suggestion: Think of something that someone has done for you. Now, go and do this for someone else. Whether this something you do is as profound as forgiveness or as ordinary as a kind word, I suspect that you will feel lighter and warmer for having done so, even on a snowy winter day.

This time of year, we say that the light is coming back, but, of course, the light, in this case the sun, never went anywhere. It is the earth that changes its orientation.

We can at any time change our orientation toward the warmth and hope and all-victorious power which opens for us the way to eternal life anytime, anyplace, even here and now.

In calling to his followers to Repent, Jesus is telling them, and us, to turn back into the Light, and then he shows them, and us, how to do it. On these cold winter days, on any day, really, why would we want to do anything else?

© Grace and Holy Trinity Cathedral