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SERMONS

The Sixth Sunday After Pentecost
July 16, 2006

The sending of the disciples

“It seems to me boys that you should make a living to live, rather than live to make a living.”

I remember the day and the moment well. Riding along in one of the school’s old vans, coming home from a camping trip, turning onto the campus, the sun going down over town, everything covered in a golden light; we were all jabbering about our futures, the possible and impossible, what trophies we might win on the road ahead. Then like a sage from a mountaintop, Mr. Makepeace very gently placed his bit of wisdom out there for us to hear.

It was the kind of voice that might come out of a deep mountain lake. One of those moments when the word spoken, and the word needing to be heard - come together - and it is as though there is some gentle bell or chime ringing in the background. We were all quiet for just a moment.

“Boys, you might want to make a living in order to live; rather than live in order to make a living.”

You may have already heard it before. To me it was like a golden doorway opening in my mind - never thought of that - never thought that possible - that living life might be the important thing, as important as making a living.

The image of the horse and the cart came to mind; it was a moment when the cart and the horse seemed to go together perfectly.

There is something more to this life than how we make a career of it; strong words to a high school student preparing for college, making life decisions. Strong words to young men being groomed to become masters and commanders, etc., etc., Esquire. The important thing in the end may not be how well you made a living, but rather how well you have lived. It had something to do with getting the horse and the cart in the proper relationship.

The Gospel passage today is centered around one word really - Apostellein – to send in the troops, to send out - from which we derive Apostle - one who is sent.

“And he sent them out two by two . . . He ordered them to take nothing for their journey.”

This is the clearest message in this morning’s reading. This is how the Gospel mission begins: no bread, no bag, no money, no extra clothing - essentially nothing, except one another, and this burning message from the heart.

Perhaps taking clothes and bags of gold might have been easier; any of us might rather take another suitcase instead of one of our Christian brothers and sisters with us on a journey.

It is very important for us to see this - our story, the Christian story, begins with no entangling alliances, no encumbrances, no compromises - no ulterior motives - there is complete transparency - the cart and the horse are in a proper relationship. It is the message of the Gospel which comes first and foremost, the mission, the being sent is the important thing, and from there the rest of the Church’s life will follow.

It is perhaps the greatest miracle outside of the Resurrection - that these apostles survive at all. This little missionary organization has nothing, absolutely nothing, that any business person, general, politician, or parish rector for that matter, considers essential for the beginning of a venture: there is no contingency plan, no provisions, no war chest, except the message that is carried in their hearts; and the friendship to hold one another up should they fall.

One of our fellow travelers at the Chapel is known to say: “My ministry finds me every day; my ministry finds me every day.”

That is essentially what Jesus is telling these first apostles, “Your ministry will find you.” Go out into the world and tell them and show them. Be a witness to what you have found.

Let your compass point to the True North of God, and they will find you. As some have said, “Jesus did not simply come to begin a new religion, but a new way of being alive.” It has something to do with getting the horse and the cart in a proper relationship.

Live it first, and the rest will follow. Be one who is sent, and then perhaps the rest of “religion” will make sense to you, and to others.

Jesus is actually pointing out that the most important work for which we are suited in this life, the sharing of the Gospel, does not require the elaborate acquisition and preservation of material goods that commands the attention of most of our lives.

Have you ever wondered if perhaps the most important thing you have done as a human being did not require the 95% effort that is normally made in our professional and social lives? Perhaps you have lived to speak the appropriate word at the right time; to ring that bell in someone’s life when an appropriate word is needed; opened a golden doorway upon a new life.

I don’t believe my teacher Tom Makepeace needed a PhD. in order to ring that bell of illumination for me; but he certainly had had to live it.

The promise is that our ministry will find us every day - it is there waiting for us; the question is whether or not we are going to be found by it.

Sometimes it seems to me that the real difficulty is not that the task our Lord invites us to is so large, so overwhelming, so complete; no the difficulty, the lump in the throat, the tightening of the chest, the pregnant pause, is really that we know, we know as did these first apostles, that our Lord is giving us an invitation that we most definitely can accept; the mission, this mission of sharing the Gospel, is within our reach.

You see, the great and terrible truth of this Gospel Mission, is that it is real, and in the end, it makes all the difference in the world about how and why we bother to live this life of ours.

To be sent is to have a True North; it is perhaps the difference between despair/hope, perhaps life and death. To be sent is to know that our ministry, our opportunity to have God in our life by sharing God’s message with someone else, will meet us every day.

I am a believer in the Nicene and Apostle’s Creed and there will be a day, the Day of Judgment, when our intentions, our consciences, are weighed equally against our deeds, I believe the question on that day will be,

“Have you been faithful, or merely successful?”

“Did you live as one sent on a mission; or did you merely make your living?”

“Did you spend your life with the cart always before the horse?”