Pentecost 12, Proper 14C
In the name of God: Lover,
Beloved, and Love. Amen.
Last Sunday, we heard that
peculiar phrase, instructing us to be “rich toward God”. This Sunday, the concept is nuanced and
developed – still within the symbolic framework of riches, but this time with
more theological and spiritual depth. It’s
not so much about “riches” as it is about a richness that is borne of
readiness.
Our value comes from being ready for God – ready to act, ready to respond, ready to answer the call.
Often, in the course of the
history of our faith, this call to “readiness” has been heard in one of two
ways: either, readiness for the return of Christ at the end of the ages, or,
readiness for meeting Christ at our death.
But truthfully, those aren’t the two kinds of “readiness” that tend to
most motivate me.
I’ve often told this story,
so forgive me if I’m repeating myself, but it kept coming back to me as I was
preparing to preach this week:
A few years after Nick Saban
came to be the head football coach at Louisiana State University, he had transformed
a team that had an at-best mixed record, into one of the leading powerhouses of
college football. They had twice won the
National Championship and people were asking how it was possible. How was it possible to have such a stark
turnaround in such a short time?
At a press conference,
following the team’s second National Championship win, one reporter asked just
that: “Coach Saban,” he said, “how did you turn this organization around so
quickly?”
His response was surprisingly
simple. He said that he had worked, from
his first day, to teach the young athletes two important lessons. First, he said, was that they had to play 60
minutes of ball. Each football game has
four fifteen minute quarters, and to be successful, you have to play all of
them. You can’t fall asleep at the
switch. You have to be engaged the
entire time. Even the most junior player
at the farthest reaches of the bench has to be ready to step in in any one of
those 60 minutes – even at the very last.
The second lesson, he said,
was that he tried to teach the players to stop looking at the scoreboard. He said that the players should let the
coaches focus on the big picture – let the coaches devise the strategy and
worry about how to get to the final win.
They players, on the other hand, should turn there focus to each play –
to each step, each pass and catch, each defensive maneuver, each block. If the players executed each play in the best
way that they knew how at every point in the game, without burdening themselves
with the numbers on the scoreboard, then the game would be played at its
highest potential.
And that’s just what
happened. The team had more games played
at their highest potential than they had before. And it turns out, when they were focused, and
ready, and fully engaged throughout the entire game, that “highest potential”
was pretty good. They won a lot of
games.
When I think about this call
to “readiness” that we hear in from Jesus this week, that’s a lot of how I hear
it. The best way for us to be ready to
meet Christ, is for us to focus each step, each play, each moment, as if it
were the moment we might meet Christ.
I don’t know when Christ will
return for the end of the ages. I don’t
know when any one of us will die. But,
what I do believe – even to the point of knowledge – is that if we are looking
for Christ, we are more likely than not to find Christ. If we are looking for ways to be the hands
and feet of Christ in the world, we are likely to find those people Christ has
called us to serve. If we are looking
for ways to bring the knowledge of God to those most separated from God, we are
more likely to find those occasions of sharing grace and good news. If we are looking to love those that seem
most unlovable, we will see love everywhere we turn – we’ll never again comprehend
“unlovable”.
That’s what it means to be
ready. To take each step as if Christ is
just around the next corner. The truth
of it is, Christ most likely is just around the next corner – we can simply be
too unready to notice.
If we live with that kind of
readiness, then it won’t matter when the end of the ages comes, or even when we
die. We’ll be ready.
We’ll be ready, not because
we had some mad rush to get ready, but because our lives had made us ready.
We’ll be ready, not because
we were afraid, but instead, we’ll not be afraid, because we were ready.
This is God’s will for
us. God longs to generously shower love
over all the creation. That’s where this
call to readiness starts: before we hear the parable, before we hear about
riches and possessions and giving alms, Jesus begins with the assurance that it
is not only God’s will, but God’s “good pleasure” to give you all that God has
to offer.
So we have to be ready. Just like we have to be ready to see Christ,
we have to be ready to accept the blessings that God has in store. And that readiness isn’t about some act of
contrition, or some moment of good behavior – it’s about living a life more
oriented toward God, Christ, and the Spirit between them. It’s about making each play in our lives with
that in mind. Not focusing on the end,
but on the moment that’s before us.
I often talk about the hard
work that it is to be a Christian – but here’s the easy part: it’s not about
the big picture. It’s not about the end
result. It’s only about the moment
before you at any given moment. That’s
all that God wants. Just that one
moment. Just that one play.
We can be ready for that.
Thanks be to God. Amen.
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