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April 24, 2005 A Sermon Preached at When I was a brand new high school English teacher, I had the privilege of working just across the hall from Madge Czarnitsky, the chair of the English department in our small country high school. Madge was plump and about four-feet tall, and with a shock of fine white hair she looked like the sort of grandmother who would feed you cookies and milk after school. She was also a South Carolinian by birth who did everything with a certain sense of style. My desk was a mess of half-graded papers and ratty textbooks, hers had a matching desk set and fresh flowers in a little vase. That vase played an important part in teaching me how much power a little old woman can wield. As I came back to my classroom one day after lunch, I heard shouts coming from Mrs. Czarnitsky’s classroom. I stepped in to investigate, and wished I hadn’t. In front of the classroom two huge country boys were locked in a death struggle, pounding each other unmercifully. I tried gingerly to get them to separate, but succeeded only in giving one of them time to grab the vase and prepare to smash it on Mrs. Czarnitsky’s desk to make a lethal weapon. I was ineffectually waving my arms when Madge returned to the classroom. From the doorway she spoke quietly: “John Henry, you put that vase down right now, it was my mother’s. Now please return to your seats, gentlemen. It is time to get to work.” To my astonishment, John Henry set the vase gently on the desk and put the flowers back in it before he and his arch enemy slipped into their places. I spent the rest of my teaching career wondering how Madge Czarnitsky worked this particular piece of magic. The only clue I ever got was the depth of her belief in her students. She once told me that it was a good idea to treat more limited students with greater respect. She said the bright ones were sure to leave town and never be seen again, while the others would stay and form the fabric of small town society. After the incident with the vase she told me I shouldn’t judge the boys too hastily, “They really are good hearted deep down.” It seems to me that we draw our power from our deepest beliefs. In a book called The Beatitudes Hugh Martin writes, “Some people’s strength is all drawn from themselves. They are like isolated pools with limited reserves. Others are more like rivers. They do not produce or contain the power, but it flows through them…The more they give, the more they are able to draw in. That strength is theirs, but it is not their own. The strength that God gives is available to those who care for others.” Our readings this morning are about the flow of power. In the first reading from Acts, Paul and Silas convey the Gospel against massive resistance. In the second reading Peter tells his readers that they are living stones built into a spiritual house by Christ, able to do marvelous things. In the reading from John’s Gospel, Jesus reminds us that the power in him flows from God. “Believe me,” he says, “that I am in the Father and the Father in me.” So the power flows from God to Jesus whose actions show us what God is like in human form, to Jesus’ followers whose actions “turn the world upside down.” The secret to accomplishing world changing and life affirming things seems to be in holding on to a sense of the power of God working through us. I often hear about how remarkable the people of St.Stephen’s are and how much we accomplish with a small group of people and very limited resources. People talk about the busy people who take the time to visit the sick, about the amazing assortment of people who—this very week—transform this place into a homeless shelter and give aid and comfort to those who are in extreme need, and about the remarkable acts of generosity from the youngest of our children who last month put on a flea market for kids in need. I’m aware that this is just the visible part of what goes on in this family because I also know about all the quiet acts of kindness you are doing daily with your own family members and the challenges you are bearing with remarkable courage. Today, I think it is important to remember that the power to do those things comes from God. In his inaugural address as President of South Africa, Nelson Mandela said, “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 and fabulous? Actually who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small doesn’t serve the world. There’s nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won’t feel insecure around you. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It’s not just in some of us; it’s in everyone. And as we let our own 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.” We need not fear our power. It flows from God, through our brother
Jesus who showed us how to be really powerful, brilliant and gorgeous,
talented and fabulous. The power of God
flows out of God and Christ into each of us.
It is true that life often presents us with daunting situations:
difficult relationships, illness, hard ways of
caring, sometimes even danger. But a
diminutive
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