March 28, 2004

Fifth Sunday of Lent

Isaiah 43:16-21

John 12:1-8

 “Not Counting the Cost”

 Isaiah 43:18-19: “Thus says the Lord…Do not remember the former things, or consider the things of old.  I am about to do a new thing: now it springs forth, do you not perceive it?  I will make a way in the wilderness and rivers in the desert!”

     This past Thursday about a dozen people got together to talk about cooperation between First and Second churches.  This “joint exploration team” has been meeting regularly since last July and the numerous cooperative ventures we’ve been sharing with Second Church are by-products of these discussions.  Helen Daghlian, Pete Hawkins, Virginia Helsel and Kent Sistare are representing First Church at the table.  Recently, the group asked UCC Southeastern Connecticut Regional Conference Minister, Rev. Kent Siladi (no relation to Kent Sistare!), to moderate the meetings and help us consider where we’ve been and where we might be going. 

     During the meeting, Kent asked us to listen as he read Isaiah 43:16-21 and to note which particular verse or word stood out to each of us.  There were a variety of responses, but for me, the one word that really leapt off the page was from verse 19, the word “perceive”.

“I am about to do a new thing; now it springs forth, do you not perceive it?”

     God may be doing a new thing even when we aren’t aware of it.  A new day may be springing forth, but we need to watch and listen for it.  Even if everything around us seems to deny it (as was the situation in Isaiah’s day), God can still be at work creating, springing new things forth.  Faith is a matter of paying attention to the miraculous process underway. 

     We don’t make it happen: this is God’s work.  Our challenge (or calling) is to perceive what is happening.  Such vision draws us into God’s plan.  It is infused with hope, trust and great expectations.  Such vision boldly proclaims in a world of hopelessness a hope that does not disappoint us.

     About 600 years after Isaiah spoke his prophetic words, a woman knelt before Jesus and poured a very expensive bottle of perfume over his feet.  She then wiped his feet with her hair.  To us, this may appear a bit unusual, but even so, little more than a tender and beautiful gesture of deep devotion.  To people of the first century, however, her actions were shocking.  The perfume cost as much as some people made in a year.  Women were not supposed to let down their hair in the presence of men.  That she would wipe Jesus’ feet with her hair, was nothing less than provocative.  There could have been big trouble for this.

     But she didn’t count the cost.  Apparently, she didn’t give a thought to the financial or social consequences because she saw something, something only she and Jesus could see.  She anointed him for burial.  He would soon give his life for the sins of the world and it seems she somehow perceived this.  Something tragic was about to happen and yet something incredibly creative and life-giving was also happening, something new that would forever redefine the things of old.  Salvation was about to spring forth. 

     In that tender, beautiful moment, nothing else mattered, not the poor or the rich or politics or religious rules or social standards - none of the things that were always with people.  A new thing was happening.  God’s creative act of salvation was springing forth in Jesus and she saw it, saw what no one else in that room but Jesus could see.  And when one sees something so incredibly precious so close, who counts the cost?

     Consider the price Jesus paid when he caught a glimpse of the incredibly creative thing God was doing through him.  Even death would not keep him from such hope, trust and great expectations for the new thing that was springing forth.   

     Can we see what that woman saw that day in Jesus?  Can we see God’s creativity in our lives?  I think so…if we’ll allow ourselves to perceive it.  But like this congestion I’ve had in my head these past two weeks, sometimes our ears are clogged.  Sometimes our eyes are cloudy.  Sometimes we get so congested with the stuff of our daily grind that days can go by, years can go by, a lifetime can go by without our catching a glimpse of God’s creativity at work, hearing little more than the sound of our own noisiness.

     Jesus healed the blind and the deaf and I think what this means for us is that he forgives us when we turn to him hoping for something more than what we’ve seen or heard thus far.  He offers forgiveness to those who desire it, those willing to slow down enough to take it in, his stirring, compelling Spirit.  There, we begin to hear and see, to perceive that which is springing forth.

     People of faith are hopeful, trusting people with great expectations.  We believe God makes good things possible even when all-the world is in denial.  We believe God’s love, pouring forth from the lives of faithful folk can overcome all things, is victorious even when everything else is in defeat.  We believe this love is the greatest force on earth and that it is redemptive and creative and that as the Apostle Paul said, it never ends.  We can even stand at a grave, mourning our loss and yet filled with genuine hope, trust and great expectations because we perceive something new springing forth even there.  So it was for Jesus.  Close to him we find, so it is for us.

     Something new is springing forth here, do you not perceive it?  Our church is filled with community activities now: plays, rehearsals, acting classes, AA, Girl Scouts, a symphony chorus, an art gallery and outreach for the needy.  In The Spire you picked up this morning, there’s a Call to Meeting, asking you to come here on April 18 to vote on an entirely new administrative structure for the church: Inspiration-Based Ministry.  Today, a group of interested people from this church is visiting (some for the second time) a Lutheran church in Rhode Island that has grown so much they have three services each Sunday (two are contemporary).  They are there because we are considering the possibility of adding a contemporary service here, opening our doors to new people.  And of course, you know how our friendship with Second Church has grown.  Now, their Council and our Council are recommending that we worship in each other’s churches this summer!  They would come here for July and we would go there for August.  We’ll decide this on April 18, too.

     There will be a cost, you know, of doing new things like this, of letting go of former things.  Should we maybe stop to count this cost?  It would be the practical thing to do, you know.  Or does a vision of something more compel us to fall on our knees instead, to pour out our hearts in devotion before the Lord?  Such vision draws us near to him, to hear, to see, to perceive the precious gift, the thing God is doing, the new thing springing forth! 

“Amazing grace!  How sweet the sound that saved a wretch like me!  I once was lost, but now am found, was blind, but now I see.”