Truth-Force

Sermon preached by the Rev. Lowell E. Grisham, Rector
St. Paul's Episcopal Church, Fayetteville, Akansas
November 25, 2006; Last Pentecost, Proper 29, Year B
Episcopal Revised Common Lectionary

(John 18:33-37) -- Then Pilate entered the headquarters again, summoned Jesus, and asked him, "Are you the King of the Jews?" Jesus answered, "Do you ask this on your own, or did others tell you about me?" Pilate replied, "I am not a Jew, am I? Your own nation and the chief priests have handed you over to me. What have you done?" Jesus answered, "My kingdom is not from this world. If my kingdom were from this world, my followers would be fighting to keep me from being handed over to the Jews. But as it is, my kingdom is not from here." Pilate asked him, "So you are a king?" Jesus answered, "You say that I am a king. For this I was born, and for this I came into the world, to testify to the truth. Everyone who belongs to the truth listens to my voice."

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You may be familiar with Mohandas Gandhi's guiding principle of "truth-force," satyagraha. (pro. sut yah gra-ha) The word literally means "steadfast effort on behalf of the truth." The word is sometimes rendered in English as "soul-force." It is the quiet and irresistible pursuit of truth. Occasionally, said Gandhi, the quiet, irresistible pursuit of truth requires civil disobedience and non-cooperation with injustice in the strong confidence that truth will always triumph. Real power eventually overcomes mere force.

So with confidence, Gandhi led India's people to oppose the British Empire's colonial rule, but, for him, that opposition was only a secondary concern. "Why worry one's head," said Gandhi, over a demise "that is inevitable? ...That is why I can take the keenest interest in discussing vitamins and leafy vegetables and unpolished rice." Gandhi's primary goals were positive ones: ending untouchability, cleaning latrines, improving the diet of Indian villagers, improving the lot of Indian women, making peace between Muslims and Hindus. Gandhi believed this is the path of "steadfast effort on behalf of the truth," and that it is the path to God. It was a path that required the non-violent overthrow of the British occupation, but only as a secondary consequence of a primary commitment to satyagraha. (sut yah gra-ha), steadfast effort on behalf of the truth. (from John Dominic Crossan, "In Search of Paul," p. 410, quoting Jonathan Schell, "The Unconquerable World.")

Vácalv Havel organized resistence to the Soviet Empire. He called his strategy "living within the truth." His was an activism "directed at achieving immediate changes in daily life" through an "unshakable commitment to achieving modest, concrete goals on the local level." He focused on the ordinary needs of ordinary people localized here and now, and he insisted on performing "repeated and consistent concrete action -- even though it may be inadequate and though it may ease only insignificantly the suffering a of a single insignificant citizen." Havel became the first President of the post-Soviet Czech Republic. (Crossan, quoting Hável, "Living in Truth.")

Are you the King of the Jews?" asked Pilate. Jesus answered, "My kingdom is not from this world. If my kingdom were from this world, my followers would be fighting to keep mefrom being handed over..." "So, you are a king?" "You say that I am a king... For this I was born, and for this I came into the world, to testify to the truth. Everyone who belongs to the truth listens to my voice."

Pilate crucified Jesus after this conversation. Jesus was crucified as the King of the Jews for proclaiming the inauguration of the Kingdom of God. Jesus asked the revolutionary question -- What would it be like if God ruled, instead of Pilate and Caesar? Then, Jesus declared this divine rule as a fact, as the truth, here and now. "Blessed are the poor, the meek, those who mourn, the peacemakers." "The blind see, the deaf hear, the lame walk, the prisoners are set free." "Your faith has made you well." "Do not be anxious; look at the birds of the field." "Give us this day our daily bread." "Forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors." "Unbind him and let him go." Jesus claimed these as facts. This is the truth. "The Kingdom of God is among you," therefore "Love your neighbor as yourself."

Pilate didn't buy it, and executed Jesus as an enemy of the state. Maybe Pilate realized how powerful and threatening the truth really is. After all, today when we ask, "What does Rome think about it," we mean a church.

Jesus went face to face with the ancient world's greatest empire. Gandhi and Havel also stood face to face with great empires in their generations. They were unarmed, as we conventionally think of armament. But their weapons were far more powerful than conventional weapons of destruction and violence. They were armed with truth. Gandhi's steadfast effort on behalf of truth; Havel's living within the truth; Jesus testifying to the truth. And they changed the world. Margaret Mead has famously said, "A small group of people could change the world. Indeed, it's the only thing that ever has."

We are the inheritors of the truth of Jesus in our generation. We are the ones who are called to live in his Kingdom, to declare it as fact. Now some people are put off by that language. We don't have kings or live in kingdoms any more. For many, "kingdom language evokes patriarchy, chauvinism, imperialism, domination, and a regime without freedom." That's "the opposite of the liberating, barrier-breaking, domination-shattering, reconciling movement the Kingdom of God was indended to be," says emergent church pastor Brian McLaren. So maybe our language could use some help. McLaren has been playing with some other metaphors for what Jesus was talking about when he proclaimed the Kingdom of God. McLaren offers six metaphors:

• The Dream of God -- "Your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven," or as McLaren puts it, "May all your dreams for your creation come true," O God, like the dreams of a mother for a child.

• The Revolution of God -- a spiritually grounded radical revolution of peace, love, reconciliation and justice that stands up to the totalitarian regime of pride, power, lust, greed, consumerism, money and all of the "isms" that divide us.

• The Mission of God -- a healing mission to cure the ills of the world.

• The Party of God -- the joyful feast of welcome and inclusive abundance, where people "stop fighting, complaining, hating, or competing and instead start partying and celebrating the goodness and love of God."

• The Network of God -- people who are plugged in, connected to God and one another in a worldwide web of love.

• The Dance of Love -- we join in union with the Father, Son, and Spirit who live "in an eternal, joyful and vibrant dance of love and honor, rhythm and harmony, grace and beauty, giving and receiving." (Brian McLaren, "Decoding Jesus," from "Sojourners Magazine," March, 2006)

Jesus started with twelve people who created a community committed to living together in this new reality. Gandhi began by including untouchables, cleaning latrines, improving nutrition, and reconciling religious enemies. Havel started by focusing on the ordinary needs of ordinary people here and now. It only takes a few people living purposefully within the values of the truth for the world to be changed. "A small group of people could change the world. Indeed, it's the only thing that ever has."

I don't know about you, but I sometimes feel overwhelmed when I read the newspaper. The problems seem insurmountable. What can we do that would make any difference?

But is our situation any more challenging than a Jewish peasant on the fringes of antiquity's greatest Empire; ...or a mediocre Indian lawyer confronting a the Empire on which the sun never set; ...or a Czech poet-playwright resisting the fierce and violent communist oligarchy? Truth-force, soul-force is more powerful then these.

Be of good courage. The Kingdom of God has drawn near. The Dream of God, God's Revolution, the Mission of God, God's great Banquet, the Network of God, the Dance of Love -- all of this is a fact, a truth to be lived within, as repeated and consistent concrete action, even though it may be inadequate and though it may ease only insignificantly the suffering of a single insignificant citizen. That is why I can take the keenest interest in discussing vitamins and leafy vegetables and unpolished rice. This is what changes the world.

I like the way Sister Joan Chittister puts it: "We are each called to go through life reclaiming the planet an inch at a time until the Garden of Eden grows green again."

The Poles of Wonder and Suffering

Sermon preached by the Rev. Lowell E. Grisham, Rector St. Paul's Episcopal Church, Fayetteville, AR November 19, 2006; 24 Pentecost, Proper 28, Year B Episcopal Revised Common Lectionary

Listen to this from poet Rainer Maria Rilke: "Take your well-disciplined strengths, stretch them between the two great opposing poles, because inside human beings is where God learns." One commentator has suggested that the two great opposing poles that stretch our disciplines and strengths are the poles of wonder and suffering. Wonder and suffering. It's pretty easy to affirm the experience of God and the growth of our connection with the Divine when we live in some circumstance of wonder. The beauty of a child asleep, the sound of a mountain brook, the refrain of music that touches the heart, a silence too deep for words. Yet, over and over in my life, and in the stories I am told, it is the crucible of suffering that also produces profound connection with the Divine, even as the horror of suffering creates possibly the greatest challenge to faith in a God we are told is supposed to be kind and loving. "Take your well-disciplined strengths, stretch them between the two great opposing poles (of wonder and suffering), because inside human beings is where God learns." It is a poetic image of the cross, where God wondrously absorbs all human evil and suffering. From that great stretching, comes new life, resurrection. + + + As Jesus came out of the temple, one of his disciples said to him, "Look, Teacher, what large stones and what large buildings!" Then Jesus asked him, "Do you see these great buildings? Not one stone will be left here upon another, all will be thrown down." Former Arkansas priest Stuart Hoke was serving as the executive assistant to the Rector at Trinity Episcopal Church on Wall Street in New York City, just a few yards from the World Trade Center. When the first plane hit the north tower, he ran to the church, put on a cassock and surplice, ran to the pulpit and began reading prayers. People started coming inside the church in droves. So there they were, reading prayers, scripture, singing hymns. Until the first tower collapsed. People screamed and jumped under the pews. All the lights went off. The place was filled with smoke and debris. Stuart said they all thought they were certainly going to die. When the noise was over, he said to the congregation, "Now it's time for you to stand and sing the second verse." They all laughed. And they sang, as they waited to die together. "Take your well-disciplined strengths, stretch them between the two great opposing poles (of wonder and suffering), because inside human beings is where God learns." As he watched the second tower collapse, Stuart felt as if his own interior had collapsed. Later, he realized it was his defenses that had collapsed. In the months following the tragedy, he felt so vulnerable. Vulnerable and cracked open. All sorts of things came up from inside him -- a lot of grief, a lot of urgency about relationships, a lot of affections for people and the need to go out and tell them that he loves them, but also to go up to them and say, "Do you love me?" He said that's something new for him to do. It is a lot of risk-taking. What one person called pitiful and incomprehensible demoralization. Stuart said, "We've had to hold each other's souls for hour upon hour and just let whatever emerge, emerge." (From the 2002 Trinity Institute, "How Then Must We Live?" -- http://www.trinitywallstreet.org/institute/content/conference/2002/?parks) Many of you remember our friend Fred Burnham's visit to St. Paul's earlier this year as one of our McMichael Series Lecturers. Fred was in a different part of the Trinity Church complex that day, planning a television filming with about thirty spiritual leaders from around the world, including then Archbishop of Canterbury elect Rowan Williams. Twice he was certain that they would all die. Escape seemed all but impossible. Fred said he discovered two things that morning. First, he discovered he was not afraid to die. That surprised him. He didn't know that about himself. Knowing he was not afraid to die, Fred experienced great freedom from anxieties, from concern about self, about the future, even about survival. The second discovery was that he loved all of the people around him. He experienced an inseparable bond between himself and the others who were with him that day. Then that love expanded universally. During the terrifying hours of the morning of September 11, he realized that he loved all humanity, he loved all of this living, pulsating alive planet. The first of our readings today imagines Michael the great archangel coming to protect in a time of unparalleled anguish and unparalleled enlightenment. In our Gospel reading, Jesus has conversation with his disciples in the presence of what some regarded as the most awe-inspiring structure in the Roman world, the rebuilt Jerusalem Temple of Herod the Great. How strange and frightening his words must have sounded. "Not one stone will be left here upon another; all will be thrown down." It would seem impossible to imagine. When we were in school in New York, Kathy and I would always take out-of-town visitors for a drink at Windows on the World the bar at the top of the World Trade Center. Such an amazing and wonderful view of the world's greatest city. It's all so hard to imagine. Yet Jesus says, "Do not be alarmed." The Jerusalem Temple was destroyed by the Romans in 70 ce. The World Trade Center fell just over five years ago. Out of each event came spiritual fire -- the dispersion of Jewish and Christian energy throughout the Roman Empire; the experience of unity with a great city in a worldwide outpouring of compassion and empathy. Whenever we are stretched between the two great opposing poles of suffering and wonder, "Do not be alarmed." These are the birthpangs of resurrection. Life in the church will be filled with wonder and suffering. Two weeks ago amidst the baptisms of beautiful children and the joyful All Saints hymns and liturgy,this place was a filled with joy and wonder and happiness. Last Sunday a beloved friend and patriarch was dying, and the sadness of loss and suffering and death was palpable. As a congregation we were stretched between the two great opposing poles of wonder and suffering "Do not be alarmed." The Whidbey Institute conducted a study over a ten-year period of over one-hundred remarkable people. They studied people who are able to sustain commitment to the common good in significant ways over time -- the people we often look to as models of compassion and sacrifice. The study discovered that every one of the one-hundred subjects had something in common. Every one of them, each of them, somewhere, someplace, sometime had experienced a constructive or a transforming encounter with otherness. Here's what they mean by that. Each of these one-hundred people who can sustain commitment to the common good had a significant encounter with some one or some group from another tribe. And, they explain, tribe exists wherever we would tolerate for them what we would not tolerate for our own. Let me say that again. Tribe exists wherever we would tolerate for them what we would not tolerate for our own. Each one of these remarkable people experienced the suffering of the other. But not just the suffering, also the longing or the joy or the wonder that create common ground among us all. They discovered an empathetic response to the wonder and suffering of someone from another tribe, and that experience transformed them into people living with a commitment to the common good, rather than just a commitment to me and mine. I think that is an important perspective, because it is not inevitable that people will respond to suffering and wonder with their fears released and their compassion enlarged. Fred Burnham also told us of others who felt haunted and afraid, freezing the trauma behind a wall of fear. Sometimes behind such walls angers are born which can be the birthpangs of hatred and even violence. This planet risks being blown apart by the angry hostilities of people who turn their suffering into sectarian violence. "Beware that no one leads you astray," says Jesus. "Do not be alarmed." We can be a fearless people, released from the anxiety of self-concern and even survival. We can be a people whose love expands universally. We can be so vulnerable and cracked open that we can risk love rather than wars and rumors of war. We can discover our empathetic response to the wonder and suffering of someone from another tribe, and be transformed into people living with a commitment to the common good, rather than just a commitment to me and mine. That's what comes out of the wonder and suffering of the cross. It is resurrection. It is new life. It is what God does best. "Take your well-disciplined strengths, stretch them between the two great opposing poles (of wonder and suffering), because inside human beings is where God learns."

Letting Go Into Freedom

Sermon preached by the Rev. Lowell E. Grisham St. Paul's Episcopal Church, Fayetteville, AR November 12, 2006 23 Pentecost; Proper 27, Year B Episcopal Revised Common Lectionary

(1 Kings 17:8-16) -- Then the word of the Lord came to Elijah, saying, "Go now to Zarephath, which belongs to Sidon, and live there; for I have commanded a widow there to feed you." So he set out and went to Zarephath. When he came to the gate of the town, a widow was there gathering sticks; he called to her and said, "Bring me a little water in a vessel, so that I may drink." As she was going to bring it, he called to her and said, "Bring me a morsel of bread in your hand." But she said, "As the Lord your God lives, I have nothing baked, only a handful of meal in a jar, and a little oil in a jug; I am now gathering a couple of sticks, so that I may go home and prepare it for myself and my son, that we may eat it, and die." Elijah said to her, "Do not be afraid; go and do as you have said; but first make me a little cake of it and bring it to me, and afterwards make something for yourself and your son. For thus says the Lord the God of Israel: The jar of meal will not be emptied and the jug of oil will not fail until the day that the Lord sends rain on the earth." She went and did as Elijah said, so that she as well as he and her household ate for many days. The jar of meal was not emptied, neither did the jug of oil fail, according to the word of the Lord that he spoke by Elijah. (Mark 12:38-44) -- As he taught, he said, "Beware of the scribes, who like to walk around in long robes, and to be greeted with respect in the marketplaces, and to have the best seats in the synagogues and places of honor at banquets! They devour widows' houses and for the sake of appearance say long prayers. They will receive the greater condemnation." He sat down opposite the treasury, and watched the crowd putting money into the treasury. Many rich people put in large sums. A poor widow came and put in two small copper coins, which are worth a penny. Then he called his disciples and said to them, "Truly I tell you, this poor widow has put in more than all those who are contributing to the treasury. For all of them have contributed out of their abundance; but she out of her poverty has put in everything she had, all she had to live on." My friend Philip had an addiction problem that rendered him homeless from time to time. I started handling his finances so he would be more consistent in managing things like his rent, utilities and other necessities. Philip rarely made more than $500 a month. Try working out a monthly budget on $500. It's pretty tough. It always amazed and humbled me, though, to witness Philip's generosity. He consistently met people and gave them money. Then he would come tell me what he had done. I would grimace, knowing how tight things were for him. "But Father," Phillip would explain, "they're so much worse off than me. I'm okay. I can get by." He had an especially soft spot for children. For a while, he was giving at least $50 a month to a little girl's parents because they were homeless, and they had a child. They needed it so much more than he did, he told me. I always think of Philip whenever I read this story about the widow of Zarephath. Though she has run out of food, and has only enough for one meal for herself and her child, she responds with courageous generosity, preparing some bread for the hungry prophet Elijah before tending to her own needs. What kind of detachment and faith does it take to be that way? And then there is the woman whom Jesus notices in the temple with her offering of two copper coins. "She out of her poverty has put in everything she had, all she had to live on." What allows someone such freedom, such fearless defenselessness? All of the classic spiritual guides tell us that there are two essentials in the spiritual life. They speak of a two-sided positive and negative bipolarity. Jesus called these two essentials "prayer and fasting." The spiritual literature speaks of "detachment and attachment," "mortification and aspiration," "discipline and desire," "death and resurrection." The mystical tradition of the spiritual journey speaks of coming out of bondage in Egypt, through the wilderness, into the Promised Land. In one scene Jesus tells his followers to take up their journey into the Kingdom of God with an empty knapsack. Speaking for this via negativa, the great spiritual director St. John of the Cross writes: "Would that I could convince spiritual persons that the road to God consists ...in one necessary thing only, in knowing how to deny themselves in earnest, inwardly and outwardly... and if he be deficient in this exercise, which is the sum and root of all virtue, all he may do will be but beating the air... utterly profitless." (quoted by Gale D. Webbe, "The Shape of Growth" p. 20. This sermon borrows from his fine chapter on "Detachment") Traditional spiritual directors are less likely to ask "how are you doing in your prayer life?" and more likely to be concerned to know "how are you doing in such things as penitence, humility, discipline, obedience, detachment, simplicity" and the like. Under the theory that you've got to pour out the dirty water before the bottle can be filled with the clean, they'll emphasize that we are rich in proportion to the things we can do without. A little like Garrison Keeler's supermarket in fictional Lake Wobegone. If you can't find it at "Ralph's Pretty-Good Grocery," you can probably live without it. Traditional spirituality knows we are free when it really doesn't matter to us whether we abound, or are in want. You know some of the sayings of Jesus. "Sell all and follow me. Whoever loses your life for my sake will find it. No one can serve two masters, God and wealth. It is as difficult for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven as for a camel to go through the eye of a needle. Everyone who has left houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or children or fields, for my name's sake, will receive a hundred-fold. Blessed are the poor." Familiar stuff isn't it? And distressing. Something seems to shout inside us, surely God doesn't expect us to give up everything in order to embrace Christ. There is such a contrast between the message of the Gospel and the message of the culture. The Gospel tells us that we are God's children, happily and utterly beloved of God and happily and utterly dependent upon God. Literally a child who lives by grace and in grace. And grace is given. Gift. Freely given. So the critical virtue for us is our ability to receive. "The spiritual life is one of letting God come in and flow through." (Webbe, p. 21) It's not like that in the world of culture that raises us. In the natural world we make progress, we adapt successfully, we survive and arrive by being competitive. And it you don't succeed, you at least try hard, and go down fighting. The world's mantra is: "Get power. And after you've gotten it, hold on to it tightly." Most of us live stretched between these two worlds. We want to give up and trust God, yet we struggle to make and defend our place. What these remarkable people like Philip and the widow of Zaraphath and the penniless woman in the Temple can teach us is that our desires are not a fixed quantity. Desire is almost infinitely flexible in both directions. How easy it is to be entertained watching "The Lives of the Rich and Famous." There is always something else to want. Today's newest thing on the market will become tomorrow's necessity. I remember how amazing and luxurious it seemed when I first saw a color TV. We've got three now. For two people. No HD, though. Yet. Don't get me wrong. The church insists that creation is good. Everything in a sacramental world can be a means of grace. Bread and wine. Water. Sometimes a mountain or the fall leaves. Often these are little windows that let God in. But most of the time, all of that stuff, and our defensive preoccupation with the stuff, are walls that block God and occupy us. Our attachment to the stuff occupies and blinds us. There is a way to lay one's self aside and step freely back into the Garden of Eden. "To have pleasure in everything and seek pleasure in nothing," says John of the Cross. "As having nothing, and yet possessing all things," says St. Paul. "The things of the world are for our use, not for our enjoyment," says St. Augustine. "That which is for our enjoyment is the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit." Or, my favorite. Tilden Edwards describes five responses on seeing a flower: * So? * Oh, beautiful-- I can sell it! * Oh, beautiful -- I want it; I will take it! * Oh, beautiful. I want it; but I will let it be! * Ah! (from "Living Simply Through the Day, p. 136) There was a rich man who dreamed that if he went outside the city he would find a poor man under a mango tree who would give him a great treasure. Early next morning he drove out in his Mercedes Benz and sure enough there was a poor man sleeping under the mango tree. He roused him from sleep and told him of his dream. The poor man yawned and stretched in a very relaxed way. He then reached into his backpack and said, "Maybe this is what you are looking for, I found it a few days ago in the forest." He presented the biggest diamond that the rich man had ever seen. "How much? How much?" the rich man asked excitedly. "Oh, if you think it will make you happy just take it," answered the other and he rolled over to go back to sleep. The rich man sang his way back to town and laughed at the poor idiot who would give away a diamond worth millions without asking even for a cent. But that night he couldn't sleep. And the next night he could not sleep. On the third morning he drove back to the poor man who was still sleeping happily under the mango three and he said, "Please, take back the diamond, and give me your real treasure." "What is that?" asked the poor man in surprise. "Your real treasure" answered the rich man, "is the freedom that enabled you to give away the diamond!" It seems that the only way we discover God in things is when we let go of them. That old Lenten practice -- self-denial -- is the tool that helps us practice the journey of freedom from our attachments.

"It's a Wonderful Life"

Sermon preached by the Rev. Lowell E. Grisham, Rector
St. Paul's Episcopal Church, Fayetteville, Arkansas
October 22, 2006; 20 Pentecost, Proper 24, Year B
Episcopal Revised Common Lectionary

(Mark 10:35-45) – James and John, the sons of Zebedee, came forward to him and said to him, "Teacher, we want you to do for us whatever we ask of you. "And he said to them, "What is it you want me to do for you?" And they said to him, "Grant us to sit, one at your right hand and one at your left, in your glory." But Jesus said to them, "You do not know what you are asking. Are you able to drink the cup that I drink, or be baptized with the baptism that I am baptized with?" They replied, "We are able." Then Jesus said to them, "The cup that I drink you will drink; and with the baptism with which I am baptized, you will be baptized; but to sit at my right hand or at my left is not mine to grant, but it is for those for whom it has been prepared."

When the ten heard this, they began to be angry with James and John. So Jesus called them and said to them, "You know that among the Gentiles those whom they recognize as their rulers lord it over them, and their great ones are tyrants over them. But it is not so among you; but whoever wishes to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wishes to be first among you must be slave of all. For the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life a ransom for many."

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Every December you can be certain that television stations will re-broadcast one of my seasonal favorites – It's a Wonderful Life. You remember the movie, starring Jimmy Stewart as George Bailey. George's father started a modest savings and loan in the village of Bedford Falls, but George wants something better for himself. He has dreams. He wants to get out of that "crummy little town" as he calls it, and "see the world." He wants to go to college. So, he turns down his father's plea to come take over the business. "I don't want to be cooped up in a shabby little office," he tells his father. "I want to do something important! ...If I didn't get away, I'd bust." His father gently tells him that what the savings and loan does is important. It helps working people of modest means to satisfy something fundamental, the urge to own their own home. But it's not what George wants for his life.

Just as George is about to move away, his father dies. The directors of the Bailey Savings and Loan vote not to close it, but only on the condition that George take over his father's place as Executive Secretary. If George doesn't, the evil millionaire Mr. Potter will take it over. Potter is a slum lord who exploits and intimidates anyone he can in order to expand his power and wealth. He seems to take delight in foreclosing mortgages whenever a tenant runs into any difficulty. George knows what Potter will do to the people his father has helped, so George shelves his plans for college and travel, and takes up the nickel-and-dime work of the little savings-and-loan business.

Throughout the movie we see that George is person who has an inclination to help others. He is someone with a willingness to serve. He understands the hopes and dreams of others, and he helps them achieve those dreams. But his service to others is costly to his own dreams. As he is leaving on his honeymoon, a financial crisis hatched by Potter causes a run on the savings and loan. George and his new wife Mary use the $2,000 saved for their honeymoon trip to try to keep the bank open.

George urges the people of Bedford Falls to "stick together" and to "have faith in each other." He sees the threat that Potter poses, not just to the savings and loan, but to their community. George tells them that Potter is trying to play on their fears and on their narrow self interests. George begs them to see the big picture. He appeals to their intellect and values and goodness. The people moderate their fearful demands enough so that the bank is saved.

George Bailey's legacy is a neighborhood of simple frame houses built and financed by the Bailey Savings and Loan at far less than market value. These homes give their owners a larger life, and a sense of personal pride and respect. In one scene, Mary and George liturgically present Mr. and Mrs. Martini with their new house, offering them bread -- so that this home will never see hunger, salt -- so their life may have flavor, and wine -- that they may have joy and prosperity forever. "Enter the Martini castle!" George announces to the gathered community.

As you remember, the story is artfully presented as a flashback. The present time is actually Christmas Eve, and George is drunk, depressed, about to take his own life because of the misplacing of an $8,000 loan through the scheming of Mr. Potter. George is financially ruined. The flashback is courtesy of a frumpy angel named Clarence, who arranges for George to see what the town would have been without him -- what Bedford Falls would have become if George had been out of the way and Potter had gained control. What he sees is a little bit like Sodom. Only then George understands, his life has made a difference. What seemed to him at the time like a series of difficult, meaningless, frustrating sacrifices had actually created a life of great meaning. A "Wonderful Life."

In the famous final scene, the whole community rallies to George's aid. Uncle Billy comes in with a basket full of money. People whom George had befriended and helped through the years spread the word about his crisis and fill his home, returning the generosity and kindness that has been George's trademark. His brother in uniform, just returned from the war, raises a glass in toast: "To my big brother George; the richest man in town." And people who cry at movies, tear up.

It is a story about " A Wonderful Life." It's a story that shows how even small acts of kindness and generosity can have great meaning. Everything we do can make a difference. It is a story about leadership. George becomes a leader through his life of service to others. Though it wasn't a path he intended, George responded faithfully, daily, with small acts of generosity and compassion. In doing so, he unknowingly created a community of powerful compassion.

I know it's just a movie. But it's a good movie with some good lessons about living a meaningful life and about becoming a leader through serving. George Bailey acts upon the smallest impulses consistently to help others. Every once in a while he needs to summons some courage, and he does so. He lives as a man of truth and a colleague that others can depend on. He is present for others, responding with care, doing those little things that help. It all adds together to create a meaningful legacy -- indeed, "It's a Wonderful Life."

❧

When James and John asked Jesus to put them in places of honor and leadership, Jesus said to all his followers, "You know that among the Gentiles those whom they recognize as their rulers lord it over them, and their great ones are tyrants over them. But it is not so among you; but whoever wishes to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wishes to be first among you must be slave of all."

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With gratitude to Margaret Wheatley whose training video "It's a Wonderful Life: Leading Through Service" is the inspiration for this sermon. We use her video in the first session of our Servant Leadership School.