What is Really Important ...

In July, while I was in Port Hardy the folks at St Columba Anglican/United Church asked me to share some of the journey that I and the folks at Minnedosa United Church have been on since our fire of February 12th ... A week or so ago I posted the first "sermon" (for lack of a better term) that I had shared, and today I would like to offer the second reflection on what I've learned to value in the days since the fire ...

Scripture Readings: 2 Samuel 11:26-12:13, Psalm 51 (pg 776 Voices – In Unison), John 6:24-35, Ephesians 4:1-16

“What’s Really Important?”

In recent weeks I’ve been reading a number of books, including Thoreau’s Walden, the story of the time he spent living in a cabin on Walden pond. Throughout the book, Thoreau reflects on the busy-ness of life in the 1840’s and muses about what it is that people have to be busy with. He offers us, even 160 years later a good excuse to pause and consider what is really important in our lives.

Thoreau inventories his list of possessions and his library, and notes that there is nothing in the cabin that is of such value that he must lock the door, and bar entry by other travelers who happen by the cabin and the pond. In the process he perhaps offers us a model that we, in the 21st Century would do well to emulate … What is really important in our lives?

In a society with HD TVs, iPods, MP3 players, cel phones, lap top computers and gadgets and gizmos for almost everything imaginable, we would do well to pause and seriously – and I mean seriously consider what it is in our lives that is really important. It’s easy to say – “the best things in life are free,” but in today’s society it is harder and harder to live and even to believe that to be true … it would do us all good to periodically revisit Walden with Thoreau and hear his timeless words about what is important, particularly when we approach this issue in faith.

This notion of valuing things that can not be bought or sold became vivid to us in Minnedosa this winter with our fire. On the day after our fire, our town had numerous media outlets descend upon it, as each tried to get a new angle on the fire story. One of the members of our congregation was being interviewed and was asked by one of the eager young reporters how she felt about the Church burning down …” Without even thinking, the member of the congregation replied – quite seriously – the Church didn’t burn down – our building did. And in the process that became our unofficial motto in the journey back from the fire. Over and over we’ve observed that the Chruch didn’t burn down – our building did. We’ve linked it with the notion that the Church is NOT a building, the Church is a people and it has become a mantra of sorts …

Over and over we’ve proclaimed and celebrated that the Church in Minnedosa didn’t burn down, our building did … It doesn’t diminish the pain and sorrow we’ve felt, but it has allowed us to talk about what we’ve lost and what is really important to our journey of faith and to our lives.

Considering what’s important in our lives is never a bad thing to do … I’ve often quipped that if something happened tomorrow and we had to flee suddenly, not unlike the experiences being endured by people of south Lebanon and Northern Israel, I could put everything that is important to me in our van and drive away … I usually say that I would try really hard to make room for Mag and the kids … But in all seriousness, the most important things in our lives are not the gadgets and gizmos, the most important things are literally those things that we carry in our hearts …

Our familial relationships … our friendships … our memories … the things that truly make us who we are … it is those things that are really important in life. The monstrous houses, the flashy new cars, the toys and gadgets and all the stuff of life are never as important as the relationships and the stuff that money can’t buy …

If we pick up a newspaper today and read about the turmoil and difficulties and conflicts that are tearing the fabric of our modern world apart, we would see that in a place like Southern Lebanon, survival, family and the bonds of family and community are really all that is important when fires rage, bombs drop or life takes an unexpected turn.

In a very real way, that is the underlying lesson from both our Old Testament reading and our Gospel reading.

In our reading from 2 Samuel, we find Nathan confronting the King following David’s indiscretions with Bathsheba. It may read like a sweet story of sorts, but it is important to remember that in this moment Nathan was taking his life into his own hands – literally. He was a religious leader with no power – and yet, he was in this moment called by God to confront the King in a very in your face kind of way. The goal of the confrontation was to remind the King that he had not only messed up in a big way – but that he had also allowed his values to get totally out of whack.

David had clearly not only lusted after Bathsheba, but had acted upon that lust, and THEN engaged in behaviour that was totally reprehensible for one who professed a belief in God.

Nathan, as God’s messenger wanted to remind David of THAT simple reality – that one who professed a belief in the God Yahweh, ought not to act the way he did. Nathan confronted David and challenged him to a better way … “You are that Man,” Nathan said with great conviction, knowing that David was going to judge himself … Yet, in that moment David could have ordered Nathan to be killed, and like Uriah, Nathan would be added to the debris field of David’s mis-deeds.
But the text tells us that David heard Nathan’s words and took them seriously …

Then we turn to our Gospel reading and we find Jesus offering a Nathan like warning to an entire crowd. Jesus says – “you come because your tummies were filled … you hunger for the bread that miraculously appeared on the hillside over there … Yet, I offer you something more … something extraordinary … and you don’t seek the Bread of Life …”

This is the crowd who hours earlier had gathered on the hillside with Jesus and the disciples and witnessed the miracle we know now as the feeding of the multitude. We can debate and argue the nature of the miracle, or we can accept that something astounding happened, and a crowd was fed because … well, because a miracle happened. Now, though the crowd was following Jesus, not because of his message, but because of the signs and wonders they had witnessed, and because they wanted to have the glitz and glamour that comes along with such happenings …

In the modern church there are fewer and fewer people who hang in seeking the glitz and the glamour, because quite frankly there isn’t much … but there are those who are here, not because they are attracted by the non-essential stuff – the unimportant stuff …
The question that hangs across the sands of times – do we have the courage to confront it and hear the words of Jesus that challenge us to consider seriously what is really important in our lives …

Think about recent new events and ask yourself what is important in this moment … the bombings in Lebanon – what is important to the people fleeing for their lives ?? The rocket attacks in Israel – what is important to the people living in fear of the next volley?? The heat wave in Eastern Canada – what’s important when the temps hit 40+ degrees??? Can the newest iPod keep you cool then

Over and over, if we have the courage to open the newspapers and read what’s happening in our world we will be confronted with that moment in time when Nathan stands in front of David saying – “you are that man,” and we will be confronted, not with our sins per se, but with our assumptions … What is important right now in this moment?? Health? Security? Having enough to eat? Clothes to wear? Family to share it with? Friends to spend time with?

The last time this reading rolled through the cycle, one of the suggested references was the old song – The cat’s in the cradle … we know the story – the little boy wants to spend time with his dad, but dad is always too busy, then one day the dad asks the boy to spend time with him, and the boy says – I can’t dad … no time, and the circle closes and Dad says – “he turned out just like me …”

The challenge for us – be we 2 or 102, is to consider what we do with our time, our energy, our resources, and our money … what is really important to us?? How do we spend that with which we’ve been so richly blessed??

At the end of our life journey what will be said of us?? How many eulogies have you heard that proclaim that they spent lots of time at work?

What’s really important … only you can decide for yourself … but the examples of David and Nathan, and the lessons of Jesus give us some pretty good roadsigns … if only we have the courage and faith to read them …