Sermon for October 13, 2024 - Harvest Thanksgiving
The Twenty-first Sunday after Pentecost
On this thanksgiving long weekend, we have an opportunity to take a moment, take stock of our journeys, spend time with friends and family. If you find yourself far from family or friends, these days might be tough. No matter where you find yourself this is a perfect time to pause, reflect, and give thanks for how God has blessed our lives, because we are blessed each in our own ways.
There is an old monastic principle about freedom, inner freedom. This freedom is known in the context of limitation, which is quite counter-cultural. We live in a culture where we are identified as “consumers,” in a market economy that is constantly alluring us with dis-satisfaction, where what is next or what is new is presumed better than what is now. More is more and never enough. We hear the adages, “Keep your options open,” and “Keep your commitments few.” The notion that what is, is enough is quite radical, and yet there is a buried treasure to be found in the grace of contentment.
By speaking of contentment, I am not talking about passivity. Quite to the contrary. I am talking about actively engaging life now. Live today. To be content is to not be seduced into thinking we must always stretch our soul ever broader, ever thinner, to take in ever-new experiences, taste new pleasures, hear new things, master new skills, buy new gadgets to be complete. Rather it’s to grow our soul downward, deeper into the ground of our being. Contentment is an active living into the depths of life now, today, given all the givens. Contentment is not about being a victim; it is certainly not about staying put in a context or relationship that is diminishing or abusive or numbing, where our energies clearly must be directed toward change. Contentment is more about being than about doing, or acquiring, or mastering, or craving, or searching. Contentment is about being satisfied given the limitations of our present life, what is not changeable. The psalmist prays, “Out of the depths, O Lord, have I cried to you; Lord, hear my prayer.” And in another place, “Be still and know that I am God.” In stillness, in letting be, be enough, in saying “yes” to the life we have been given now, the grace of contentment is to be discovered and savoured. The American poet e. e. cummings writes:
i thank You God for most this amazing
day: for the leaping greenly spirits of trees
and a blue true dream of sky; and for everything
which is natural which is infinite which is yes…
Life is inevitably full of movement, and we know that Jesus was often on the go. He says more than once to his followers, “Come, follow me.” He sends his followers out: “Go into all the world.” He talks about labouring and sowing and harvesting. And yet Jesus also talks about being. Simply being is what can be so elusive and so lost. “Abide with me,” we hear Jesus saying.” “Stay with me,” he says. It is this sense that the incompleteness of life, as we experience it now, is enough. What we need is here. The treasure for which we search is likely buried under our own porch. And so, as we heard in this morning’s Gospel lesson, Jesus’ saying, “Do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring worries of its own. Today’s trouble – and, I would add, today’s provision – is sufficient for today.” Live into what is already at hand. And so, we hear Jesus commending us to learn the secrets from the flowers of the field, “Consider the lilies…” he says. “Look at the birds of the air.” The great Christian mystic of the fourteenth century, Julian of Norwich, found the truth of all being meditating on the mystery and majesty of a hazelnut. St. Francis of Assisi found creation teeming with God’s presence:
Be praised, my Lord, for all your creatures, and first for brother sun, who makes the day bright and luminous…beautiful and radiant with great splendor…Be praised, my Lord, for sister moon and the stars, in the sky you have made them brilliant and precious and beautiful…
Be praised, my Lord, for our sister, mother earth, who nourishes us and watches over us and brings forth various fruits with colored flowers and herbs…
We gather here this morning to celebrate the Holy Eucharist, the Greek word “eucharist” meaning “great thanksgiving.” It is not that we normally live very ordinary, secular, horizontal lives and then have these special occasions, such as this evening, as a “spiritual moment,” a fleeting transcendent experience, then to return to our ordinariness. Rather, we celebrate the Holy Eucharist as a kind of living reminder, a template of how to live our lives all the time: “living eucharistically,” living our lives with a posture of gratitude and thanksgiving for all that is.
The real presence of Christ is really present in the ordinary present. To stay in touch with God’s presence requires practice. We don’t need a special cushion on which to sit, nor a special lamp to light, nor a special incense to burn, nor a special prayer or mantra to recite, nor even a special monastery to visit. None of that is bad; it may well help. It is simply not enough. What is enough is now. Start with what is now: with your breath, with what you can see and hear and feel now. Pay attention to now, which is a gift, and be thankful.
The psalmist says, “Taste and see that the Lord is good.” Take time these next few days to gaze. Sit on your porch or by a window. Take time to savour what is now in your life, today. Pray and practice the living and enjoying of your life in every way you can, especially given what you cannot change. Enjoy life, which is to let joy sink in deeply: to en-joy. So little of life is within our own control and it is all very fleeting. Do not miss a moment of it. Presume the invitation to transcendence is immanent. This is the grace of contentment, living in the “sacrament of the present moment.” I am not speaking about tomorrow. Tomorrow is only a possibility. Yesterday is gone and past. What we have now is the gift of today, which is a splendid gift indeed. Say yes to your life. Savour the moments of your life. Be thankful everywhere and in every way you possibly can for the hugely challenging, utterly amazing gift of your life.
