Good Enough

Sermon preached by the Rev. Lowell E. Grisham, Rector
St. Paul's Episcopal Church, Fayetteville, Arkansas
June 1, 2008; 3rd Sunday after Pentecost; Proper 4, Year A
Episcopal Revised Common Lectionary

(Matthew 7:21-29) -- Jesus said. "Not everyone who says to me, `Lord, Lord,' will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father in heaven. On that day many will say to me, `Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many deeds of power in your name?' Then I will declare to them, `I never knew you; go away from me, you evildoers.'

"Everyone then who hears these words of mine and acts on them will be like a wise man who built his house on rock. The rain fell, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house, but it did not fall, because it had been founded on rock. And everyone who hears these words of mine and does not act on them will be like a foolish man who built his house on sand. The rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell-- and great was its fall!"

Now when Jesus had finished saying these things, the crowds were astounded at his teaching, for he taught them as one having authority, and not as their scribes.
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I've shared more personally in our 10:00 Christian Formation hour than I tend to do in preaching. There is something informal and intimate in that other setting. Visiting in front of the fireplace in the Parish Hall is a setting that invites conversation -- the give and take that nurtures the exchange of intimacies. The singularity of the pulpit makes me cautious about talking about "my stuff," lest it turn into something about me rather than something about God and something about God and us. But I'd like to risk telling a little bit about the foundation on which I was built, and how I needed to dig beneath some sand to get to a bit of solid rock.

I was the first and only son of an only child. My father was the first from his extended family to go to college and get a professional degree. Underneath his drive was a powerful mother, who raised him with high expectations and planted in him a subconscious need for perfection. Subconsciously, naturally, he passed on those expectations of perfection to his son. There was no malice or ill will involved; it was simply the only thing he knew, the only way he knew how to be.

My experience of salvation was largely an experience of liberation from unreasonable expectations. For me grace came when my value was no longer connected to my performance. Maybe that's why I like the apostle Paul so much. I feel in him a kindred spirit. I know in my bones what he means when he speaks of "justification by grace through faith." Or Paul Tillich's rephrasing of that statement: "Simply accept the fact that you are accepted."

The angel who mediated my salvation was my roommate Bubba. Bubba grew up with, well..., fewer expectations than I did. I can see his jubilant face as he raised his Pabst Blue Ribbon to the heavens in glad thanksgiving, "I passed freshman English, Lowell. Look! A 'D'! Can't wait to tell my Dad. He'll be so relieved." When I came home with a 96, I was asked, "Well, what did you miss?"

What I realized while living with Bubba, was that he was happier that I was. And I wanted to be more like Bubba. Now, I wasn't Bubba. "D's" weren't necessarily in my nature. But when I decided that an "85" was just fine -- I didn't have to make a "100" -- I made a quantum leap in happiness. And when I realized that my Heavenly Father loved me unconditionally, even through the failures that if graded would have been "F's," something deep inside me was healed. It was on that foundation of God's unqualified love that I built a new way of being in the world.

Along the way, I picked up phrases or ideas that helped crystalize that central theme. For a while, "Your best is good enough," was comforting. Then I heard a line to trumped that: "Anything worth doing is worth doing badly." I like that one. I like that one a lot. Take that one with you and think about it some, especially if it bothers you.

Every time I've started a new job, my first sermon quotes Robert Wicks: "Have low expectations and high hopes." Low expectations of people, and of me, so you don't force your control needs upon them so much; but high hopes grounded in the faith that God is always present, doing something good, something wonderful in every situation. Accept the moment, do what you can, and expect to be surprised.

Voltaire said, "The best is the enemy of the good." Good enough is good enough. Pursuing perfection, whatever that is, becomes infinitely more difficult as you get near to it. There is a time to say simply, "That's good enough," and be satisfied. "Good enough" is usually very effective. To insist on perfection so often devalues the good. "Don't call them perfectionists," said my Clinical Pastoral Education supervisor, "call them what they are. Fault-finders. There's no such thing as a perfectionist."

There is some deep wisdom in Garrison Keillor's folksy stories of "Lake Wobegon," "where all the women are strong, all the men are good looking, and all the children are above average." In Lake Wobegon they do their shopping at "Ralph's Pretty Good Grocery," where the motto is, "if you can't get it at Ralph's, you can probably get along without it."

Swarthmore College psychology professor Barry Schwartz tells of a recent trip to the market where he "encountered 285 varieties and brands of cookies, 75 iced tea drinks, 40 toothpastes, 230 soups, 175 salad dressings, and 275 cereals." Would you like to buy some jeans. Do you want slim fit, relaxed fit, easy fit, boot cut or straight leg, button fly or zipper fly, stonewashed, acid washed, distressed, or unwashed? And that's not even considering the designer jeans.

How about religious consumers? Restless spiritual seekers may find themselves dabbling in this and grabbing for that, like customers trying all 40 brands of toothpastes to see which one is the right one. Others, faced with the vastness of spiritual choices, will freeze, staking their religious fortune to some claim of perfection, defensively trying to devalue all other religious claims in the shade of whatever light they have seen. In their anxiety to be right, they flip the "off" button.

Dr. Schwartz cites studies that show that for many Americans, as the number of potential choices goes up, we tend to freeze, becoming "more stressed, anxious, pessimistic, regretful, disappointed, frustrated, and depressed." Some examples: as the number of retirement plans available increases, the chances that people will choose any plan decline. As the number of optional assignments available to students increases, the likelihood that they will write on any of the topics decreases, and the quality of the work produced by those who do also falls.

There is a great burden placed on people to make the best decision: to find the best job, the best cell phone plan, the best digital camera, the best school, the best church. Studies show that plentiful choice increases the chance that people will regret their decisions because of all of the alternatives they passed up. Was there something better I could have chosen? (1)

We ingest cultural messages that tell us "only the best is good enough." I disagree. The best is the enemy of the good. And good enough is good enough.

I've wondered whether some of the pathology that drives religions to make absolute or infallible claims for their beliefs or their texts is our subconscious appetite for the perfect. Our desire for the whole, the perfect, the complete is actually our deepest, inner desire for God. Each of us has a God-shaped vacuum within us that is the source of our deepest, most passionate desires. Yet only God can fill that vacuum. Only the infinite, ultimate and mysterious Reality of God can truly satisfy us. But God is ultimate and mysterious. We can't define and confine God. In the anxiety of living in the mystery, we replace God with other things and say they are whole, perfect and complete. But only God is God. Not the Bible. Not the Church.

We can't grasp and hold the perfect and the infinite, even though that is our deepest desire. But good enough is good enough. The Bible and the Church are fingers pointing to the holy and mysterious One who is God. There are other fingers that also point toward God: the beauty of nature; wonder of creation; the crack of a poem; the pursuit of truth; the sound of music; the surrender of love; the heart of compassion; the devotion of faiths; the love of humanity; the vastness of silence.

For me, I've found a way that works for me. In this spiritual tradition of the Episcopal Church, I am directed toward the ultimate from within a community that drinks from deep and ancient wells. This tradition is not perfect, and it does not have all the answers. Happily, it is a tradition that is open to learning from other sources. It is not perfect, but it is good enough. I am satisfied. I am pointed toward God who is whole and holy, healing and challenging, present and yearning. I can rest, for I am loved. I can reach beyond my grasp, for I am held. I can be. Simply be. And from that rested place of being, I can do "good enough." And whatever is worth doing, is worth doing badly.
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1. Barry Schwartz, Can You Say No to Too Many Choices?; Spirituality & Health, May/June, 2007, p. 58.