Proper 9C • 4 July 2010
Thirty or so miles down the road in little Plymouth, Vermont, a crowd of people is gathering for the annual Fourth of July observance. It wasn’t until after purchasing property just up the road from the historic village that I realised that Calvin Coolidge was born in Plymouth, sworn into the presidency upon the occasion of Warren Harding’s death and ultimately was buried in the Plymouth Notch Cemetery. Nor did I know that his birthday is July 4th (he is the only president to have that birth date) and that every year, the White House sends a wreath to be placed on a deceased president’s grave on his birthday. I learned all these things 18 years ago and whenever I can (i.e., when the Fourth does not land on a Sunday), attend the ceremony.
The noon ceremony is one of those slices of Americana: tourists and locals gather in front of the summer White House and then process the short distance from there across Route 100A to the cemetery. They follow a rag-tag colour guard, mostly Viet Nam vets, though when I first started attending there were some Korean and WWII vets. Members of Vermont’s National Guard also march.
Once across Rte 100A and in front of the cemetery, the participants go up onto the little knoll where one sees four tall gravestones. The only thing that distinguishes Coolidge’s tombstone from the others is the presidential seal etched into the granite. The colour guard stops, and the representative from the Vermont National Guard places the floral wreath on a stand in front of the president’s tomb. In years past, a local member of the clergy would speak… longer than any of us wanted to hear (!), but now the Adjutant General or like person just says a couple of words, containing a good quote from Silent Cal. Up until the late 1990s, John Coolidge, Cooldige’s oldest child, attended; after his death, grandchildren and great grandchildren show up.
At the end of the fifteen-minute ceremony, two buglers play echo taps. Even though I expect that song, every year it brings tears to my eyes. And, yes, even participating in this small slice of Americana reminds me of one of my identities.
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When the Fourth of July falls on a Sunday, the preacher and liturgist is faced with a conundrum: do we observe the Fourth or do we continue with the Sunday lectionary? I am sort of a ‘strict liturgist’ here; the Sunday lectionary takes precedence over feast days like the Fourth, which is only one of two national holidays that are included in our church calendar (Thanksgiving being the other). Hence, we hear the Sunday readings as they fall in their course. But we have also made note of today through our hymnody and the choral anthem written by the 18th-century US composer, William Billings. You can call it trying to have the best of two worlds.
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Back to what I said about one of my identities… I don’t dwell on the fact that I am a national of the United States, though I am reminded of it every time I travel outside of the country and have to show my passport, aware of how easy it is for me coming from here, and then as I go about because I look and sound different. I do, however, tend to spend more time thinking about my other major identity, one given to me but one that is not automatic the way my nationality is: that is, a Christian, a follower of Jesus. That identity I have chosen over and over again. That identification is a conscious one. With that identification, comes the responsibility of sharing and there I wonder how well I do it or, for that matter, any of us do. Sharing – in church-speak, the dreaded word of evangelism, which simply comes from the Greek root from which also dervies our word, gospel. As I remind my mother often, evangelism is quite a different entity from evangelical.
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Luke’s gospel, for the second time, directs us to be evangelists whose message is simple: ‘The kingdom of God is near.’ The first time Luke sends people out, he chooses twelve — the apostles — and gives them power and authority over all demons, to cure diseases, to preach the kingdom of God and to heal. The first go-round in Luke, Jesus tells the disciples, ‘Take nothing for your journey, no staff, nor bag, nor bread, nor money — not even an extra tunic. Whatever house you enter, stay there, and leave from there. Wherever they do not welcome you, as you are leaving that town shake the dust off your feet as a testimony against them.’ Off the twelve go, preaching the gospel and healing everywhere.
A chapter later, Jesus sends out seventy (or seventy-two, depending on the translation used). If we go with seventy, it represents for Israel historically and traditionally the number of nations. Seventy also represents the number of persons involved in translating the Hebrew Scriptures into Greek. Most important, it represents the seed and sanction for the continuing evangelism portrayed in Luke’s second book, the Book of Acts.
But something interesting happens in Jesus’ instructions to the seventy. He makes clear it is not the evangelist who barges in, imposing his or her message on someone unsuspecting. It is not the evangelist who holds the power, who holds the person captive. Instead, Jesus states emphatically that it is the evangelist who is a guest in someone else’s space. The evangelist is the one who is received — or not received — by the host. The evangelist is the one who listens first before proclaiming.
Notice also the utter vulnerability of the evangelist. There is nothing of the armed camp of Christendom riding roughshod over the supposed pagans. Instead, the evangelist is stripped down to the bare minimum of possessions — so stripped down that he or she has to rely on the hospitality of the very persons to whom he or she wishes to proclaim the good news of God’s love and salvation through Christ. (1)
This picture of the evangelist is a very different one than the one with which I grew up — you know, the Billy Graham sort, standing in a stadium issuing an altar call for people to come up and accept Jesus as their personal Lord and Saviour. In some ways, that picture is almost too easy.
Perhaps that is why the image that Luke offers — one of utter vulnerability and humility — appeals to me more. The fact that the evangelist is called to respect the cultural traditions and norms of the people in whose space she or he enters, the fact that the evangelist listens, and then proclaims the message of God’s grace, appeal. And buried deep down inside of Luke’s message is also one of reconciliation. This deeper message of reconciliation is perhaps harder to get at since the gospel tells the apostles they are to shake the dust from their feet if they are not received. But that is all they do. They do not shove the message down people’s throats.
Now some may criticise me for not being aggressive enough… for not going out to bring in all the lost souls. Forgive me if my approach does not seem forceful enough. Perhaps there is room for all of us. There are those of us who would rather woo people toward God, just as God woos us to know God. Bear with me as I speak of an evangelistic approach that is non-threatening, non-invasive.
What can evangelism mean?
Nothing extravagant, nothing coercive, nothing invasive.
What can evangelism mean?
Something caring, something gentle, something that will let others know the kingdom of God is near. Something that conveys the message that ‘God loves you.’
Now that’s evangelism! Not a pollyana sort — but witnessing to a deep, down abiding faith that God loves you. And the power to remind gently someone of God’s love for them, too.
A gentle evangelism is like the witness of a Salvadoran woman I once met who told me that when she was shoved by someone on the crowded bus, she didn’t lash out with unkind words as would have been justified. Instead, she remembered her baptismal promise to be a reconciler and kept her mouth shut… already a start.
Indeed, being reconcilers in this world is a powerful form of evangelism and one that I think we can do well. It certainly is part of our baptismal covenant: to carry on Christ’s reconciliation in and to the world.
That reconciliation means that we love those who offend us anyway, regardless of how they treat us because they are also God’s beloved children. Tell others of God’s love for them, with no conditions, no strings attached other than they are already God’s beloved… even if they have wandered far away from God or never knew God. Maybe you have been the recipient of that message, that God loves you anyway and always has.
One of the stories that emerged from the great floods of 1998 concerns an 85 year-old man who was rescued from his swamped trailer up in Bristol. During the whole ordeal of being carried out in EMT personnel’s arms, he kept up a steady stream of bantering. He allowed the press to interview him, joking all the way. He kidded around with the ambulance crew as they took him to the hospital to be checked out. But when all the people left, and the only person standing by him was an EMT, one of my brother priests, the old Vermonter began to cry. In his tears, he said that all he owned was in that trailer. And worse, his cat was somewhere in there, and he was afraid it had drowned. The priest covered up his EMT badge, leaned over and said quietly into the old man’s ear, ‘You know, God loves you.’
That priest is Don Morris, the interim who served here before my arrival. What a gentle but strong example! We all can learn from him and others who are not afraid to speak out of God’s love.
How do you proclaim to others that God loves them? When was the last time you invited someone to come and see, to join you here for church? When was the last time you claimed being an evangelist?
We inhabit many worlds but give thanks to God that we live in a place where we can proclaim our faith without fear and share it with others. So, let’s not squander this gift. Go out and tell others that God loves them. And then bring them here so we can join them on their journey to know this amazing God. It’s all a part of who we are… followers of Jesus.
END NOTE
(1) These paragraphs are based, in part, on an article by Bill Wylie-Kellerman, ‘Singing the Lord’s Song to people and powers’ in The Witness, Vol. 75, No 1, January 1992, 8-10.
