What Really Matters
Text: Lamentations 1:1-6; Mark 13:1-6
There is a story of a radio conversation between a U.S. Navy aircraft carrier (U.S.S. Abraham Lincoln) and Canadian authorities off the coast of Newfoundland one dark and blustery October.
It goes something like this:
Canadians: Please divert your course 15 degrees to the South to
avoid collision.
Americans: Recommend you divert your course 15 degrees to the
North to avoid a collision.
Canadians: Negative. You will have to divert your course 15
degrees to the South to avoid a collision.
Americans: This is the Captain of a US Navy ship. I say again,
divert YOUR course.
Canadians: No, I say again, you divert YOUR course.
Americans: THIS IS THE AIRCRAFT CARRIER USS LINCOLN, THE SECOND
LARGEST SHIP IN THE UNITED STATES' ATLANTIC FLEET. WE ARE
ACCOMPANIED BY THREE DESTROYERS, THREE CRUISERS AND NUMEROUS
SUPPORT VESSELS. I DEMAND THAT YOU CHANGE YOUR COURSE 15 DEGREES
NORTH--I SAY AGAIN, THAT'S ONE FIVE DEGREES NORTH--OR
COUNTER-MEASURES WILL BE UNDERTAKEN TO ENSURE THE SAFETY OF THIS SHIP.
Canadians: This is a lighthouse. Your call.
This story has been circulating around the internet for a few years now. Despite some claims, it didn’t actually happen… or at least this isn’t a transcript of an actual event. It is a variant on a much older story that has been around for decades that may or may not be based on a real incident from a time before sea-borne radar and GPS. Writer Isaac Asimov told at least one version of it. Yet as funny as this story is, it speaks to our fallible human nature, and the dangers of being so confident in our own position, that we are unable or unwilling to change, leading to our ultimate downfall.
Similarly, I remember a conversation from a General Assembly that I was at around ten years ago. When someone lamented the slow pace of change, someone responded “big ships turn slowly!” It seemed to carry the day, at least for a little while, until someone rather wisely pointed out that the Titanic was a big ship that didn’t turn fast enough.
This past Tuesday, I was at our September meeting of Presbytery, and Wes Denyer’s sermon opened with a variant on the big ship story and asked the big question to the ministers and elders if we are too much like the big ship barrelling towards the lighthouse… and can we adjust our course, or will we run aground.
Part of it is priorities. The story from Mark’s gospel this morning gives us an insight into what was important for Jesus, of what really matters… or perhaps more specifically, what shouldn’t matter. As the story goes, it’s actually a very short one. Shortly after their arrival in Jerusalem, one of the disciples is looking around at all the magnificent buildings and marvels at their size and beauty… especially the Great Temple. It’s a natural reaction for people who have spent their lives in rural villages, or on the lakeshore. “Look at all this” they say… to which Jesus responds “You’re impressed by this? Take a good look at them, but one day this will all be knocked down, not one stone will be left on top of each other!”
Some day, it’s all going to be rubble. Well, that’s inspiring!
Jesus isn’t just saying this to be a killjoy, he’s actually saying it out of both experience and anticipation. Nothing made by human hands stands forever. The Great Temple in Jerusalem had been destroyed once before, which is the source of the entire book of Lamentations. It had all come down a the hands of the Babylonians… and prophetically, the Temple would come down again less than 40 years after Jesus said these words… and the Temple would never be rebuilt. Even today it stands in ruin.
Sure he’s being provocative. Jesus was trying to get the disciples to see beyond the material matters around them and to see the world with God’s eyes. What mattered to God wasn’t the buildings or the structures… it was the people: the relationships that we have and share. Jesus was calling us to consider what really matters, and reminding the disciples that this Temple was once torn down, and it will be torn down again. Many learned the lesson last time, but many didn’t. Even with the Temple destroyed, the faith that it once symbolized has grown and flourished in ways far beyond the imagining of those who once worshipped on its steps.
Nothing made by human hands stands forever.
The passage from Lamentations drew its inspiration from when the Temple was destroyed the first time. Judah had run aground, having once forgotten who they were and what really matters. The time of the exile would see them re-discover that... at least for a time. But by the time that Jesus came, the people had once again forgotten that lesson in history. As Jesus predicted, it was a lesson that they would learn again the hard way.
I think for us in the church in North America, it is a lesson that we are struggling to re-learn ourselves. Remember that Jesus did not say, “Go into the world and build historical monuments in my name.” He said, “Go into the world and make disciples of all nations.” And even gave us the tools to be able to do that. Jesus gave us a gift to help us remember what really matters.
In making disciples of all nations, this isn’t some sort of crusade to force people to say the right words or else. The tool that Jesus gave was a simple act that was a symbol of something far more profound. In the act of sitting down together for a special meal, of breaking bread together, we’re building a community by building relationships with each other. Without the relationships of trust with each other, we cannot even begin to live out our Christian Faith.
Communion is an incredibly powerful Symbolic Act… more can be built on a simple ritual of gathering together and breaking bread than by laying bricks and mortar on top of each other. Holy Communion is our way of looking beyond the physical structures of where we gather. For the church, in those early days, they met in people’s homes, around what we might recognize as a dining room table. There was no building… there were only people. Buildings weren’t even needed in the early church. They would only come much later.
Yet I have seen congregations torn apart by bickering over bricks and mortar... and in North America it really has been one of the contributing factors in our decline. As one of my colleagues reminded us this past week: “The church in not dying. Our small corner of it is, but the church of Christ is alive and well... because many have heard the call of gathering together as Christ’s people.” Maybe we do have time to turn before we run aground. As the lighthouse keeper says in that story, it’s our call.
After the people of Israel had run aground, and found themselves in exile, they began to learn that what really mattered was not the bricks and mortar, but the relationships they had with each other, because it was through those relationships with one another that people began to experience their relationship with God in a new and very positive way… but they only learned this after running aground.
As the lighthouse says at the end of the story, “your call.”
For us, perhaps this is a lesson that we need to re-learn. We can start by realizing that we are gathering together around this table as a community of Christ... and above everything else, that’s what really matters.
Amen.
There is a story of a radio conversation between a U.S. Navy aircraft carrier (U.S.S. Abraham Lincoln) and Canadian authorities off the coast of Newfoundland one dark and blustery October.
It goes something like this:
Canadians: Please divert your course 15 degrees to the South to
avoid collision.
Americans: Recommend you divert your course 15 degrees to the
North to avoid a collision.
Canadians: Negative. You will have to divert your course 15
degrees to the South to avoid a collision.
Americans: This is the Captain of a US Navy ship. I say again,
divert YOUR course.
Canadians: No, I say again, you divert YOUR course.
Americans: THIS IS THE AIRCRAFT CARRIER USS LINCOLN, THE SECOND
LARGEST SHIP IN THE UNITED STATES' ATLANTIC FLEET. WE ARE
ACCOMPANIED BY THREE DESTROYERS, THREE CRUISERS AND NUMEROUS
SUPPORT VESSELS. I DEMAND THAT YOU CHANGE YOUR COURSE 15 DEGREES
NORTH--I SAY AGAIN, THAT'S ONE FIVE DEGREES NORTH--OR
COUNTER-MEASURES WILL BE UNDERTAKEN TO ENSURE THE SAFETY OF THIS SHIP.
Canadians: This is a lighthouse. Your call.
This story has been circulating around the internet for a few years now. Despite some claims, it didn’t actually happen… or at least this isn’t a transcript of an actual event. It is a variant on a much older story that has been around for decades that may or may not be based on a real incident from a time before sea-borne radar and GPS. Writer Isaac Asimov told at least one version of it. Yet as funny as this story is, it speaks to our fallible human nature, and the dangers of being so confident in our own position, that we are unable or unwilling to change, leading to our ultimate downfall.
Similarly, I remember a conversation from a General Assembly that I was at around ten years ago. When someone lamented the slow pace of change, someone responded “big ships turn slowly!” It seemed to carry the day, at least for a little while, until someone rather wisely pointed out that the Titanic was a big ship that didn’t turn fast enough.
This past Tuesday, I was at our September meeting of Presbytery, and Wes Denyer’s sermon opened with a variant on the big ship story and asked the big question to the ministers and elders if we are too much like the big ship barrelling towards the lighthouse… and can we adjust our course, or will we run aground.
Part of it is priorities. The story from Mark’s gospel this morning gives us an insight into what was important for Jesus, of what really matters… or perhaps more specifically, what shouldn’t matter. As the story goes, it’s actually a very short one. Shortly after their arrival in Jerusalem, one of the disciples is looking around at all the magnificent buildings and marvels at their size and beauty… especially the Great Temple. It’s a natural reaction for people who have spent their lives in rural villages, or on the lakeshore. “Look at all this” they say… to which Jesus responds “You’re impressed by this? Take a good look at them, but one day this will all be knocked down, not one stone will be left on top of each other!”
Some day, it’s all going to be rubble. Well, that’s inspiring!
Jesus isn’t just saying this to be a killjoy, he’s actually saying it out of both experience and anticipation. Nothing made by human hands stands forever. The Great Temple in Jerusalem had been destroyed once before, which is the source of the entire book of Lamentations. It had all come down a the hands of the Babylonians… and prophetically, the Temple would come down again less than 40 years after Jesus said these words… and the Temple would never be rebuilt. Even today it stands in ruin.
Sure he’s being provocative. Jesus was trying to get the disciples to see beyond the material matters around them and to see the world with God’s eyes. What mattered to God wasn’t the buildings or the structures… it was the people: the relationships that we have and share. Jesus was calling us to consider what really matters, and reminding the disciples that this Temple was once torn down, and it will be torn down again. Many learned the lesson last time, but many didn’t. Even with the Temple destroyed, the faith that it once symbolized has grown and flourished in ways far beyond the imagining of those who once worshipped on its steps.
Nothing made by human hands stands forever.
The passage from Lamentations drew its inspiration from when the Temple was destroyed the first time. Judah had run aground, having once forgotten who they were and what really matters. The time of the exile would see them re-discover that... at least for a time. But by the time that Jesus came, the people had once again forgotten that lesson in history. As Jesus predicted, it was a lesson that they would learn again the hard way.
I think for us in the church in North America, it is a lesson that we are struggling to re-learn ourselves. Remember that Jesus did not say, “Go into the world and build historical monuments in my name.” He said, “Go into the world and make disciples of all nations.” And even gave us the tools to be able to do that. Jesus gave us a gift to help us remember what really matters.
In making disciples of all nations, this isn’t some sort of crusade to force people to say the right words or else. The tool that Jesus gave was a simple act that was a symbol of something far more profound. In the act of sitting down together for a special meal, of breaking bread together, we’re building a community by building relationships with each other. Without the relationships of trust with each other, we cannot even begin to live out our Christian Faith.
Communion is an incredibly powerful Symbolic Act… more can be built on a simple ritual of gathering together and breaking bread than by laying bricks and mortar on top of each other. Holy Communion is our way of looking beyond the physical structures of where we gather. For the church, in those early days, they met in people’s homes, around what we might recognize as a dining room table. There was no building… there were only people. Buildings weren’t even needed in the early church. They would only come much later.
Yet I have seen congregations torn apart by bickering over bricks and mortar... and in North America it really has been one of the contributing factors in our decline. As one of my colleagues reminded us this past week: “The church in not dying. Our small corner of it is, but the church of Christ is alive and well... because many have heard the call of gathering together as Christ’s people.” Maybe we do have time to turn before we run aground. As the lighthouse keeper says in that story, it’s our call.
After the people of Israel had run aground, and found themselves in exile, they began to learn that what really mattered was not the bricks and mortar, but the relationships they had with each other, because it was through those relationships with one another that people began to experience their relationship with God in a new and very positive way… but they only learned this after running aground.
As the lighthouse says at the end of the story, “your call.”
For us, perhaps this is a lesson that we need to re-learn. We can start by realizing that we are gathering together around this table as a community of Christ... and above everything else, that’s what really matters.
Amen.
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