by Rev. Thomas Disrud

A sermon given January 13, 2008

First Unitarian Church

Portland, Oregon

CALL TO WORSHIP

We come together once again to this place

bringing our hopes and our dreams

our longings and our fears.

Mindful that the spirit dwells among us,

May we find courage and sustenance for the journey.

It is good that we are here together.

Come and let us worship.

A new year is a time for a fresh start.  That’s certainly what new year resolutions are about.  But it is about at this point in the new year—maybe a little early for some, but I expect not so for others—when our resolutions are already starting to fall by the wayside. I’ve gotten a little skeptical about resolutions over the years—maybe because of how little time it takes for them to disappear.

And yet there is a good impulse behind all those resolutions.  They are about wanting to make a fresh start.  They are about the desire to let go of the old patterns and to begin with something that is healthier or more virtuous or more productive or … you name it. That desire for change, that desire to start fresh is a good one.  But so often that doesn’t seem to last very long.  I think the statistic I heard recently is that about 90 percent are already out the window by the end of January.

Why is that? There are lots of reasons, probably, but most of all because change, no matter how much we want it—is hard.  Just the word is hard to define.  Now we are certainly hearing plenty about it in the presidential race these days, and it is certainly an elusive concept.  We may talk about change, but what does it mean to actually bring it into being?

Sometimes we have to step back a ways to get some perspective. That is hard to do in our lives, to see things with some distance.  Each one of us sees a world that is based on our assumptions.  And change may ask us to question some of the assumptions that we carry around with us. We may not even be aware of some of the assumptions we carry. We see the world in the way we see it and that is that.  But in reality, it is all a matter of perspective.

There’s a story about a man recognizing Pablo Picasso on a train.  The man asks the artist why he did not paint people “the way they really are.”  Picasso asked what he meant by that expression.  The man opened his wallet and took out a snapshot of his wife, saying, “That’s my wife.”  Picasso responded, “Isn’t she rather small and flat?”[1]

Each one of us sees things from our own perspective.  We see things the way we see them.  Each one of us has a story.  Each one of us has a narrative of how we see our lives. That likely also extends to how we see our families, our communities, our world.

And over time those assumptions get woven into that narrative.  We may see ourselves as virtuous, as heroic or we may see ourselves as broken or maybe unlovable.  We may see ourselves in all kinds of ways, whether they are realistic or not.  But once that narrative gets put in place, it becomes part of us. 

Now it is important that we have a narrative that makes sense.  The world, after all, needs to be of a whole and to make sense.  We need for the pieces to fit together.  We come to find those places where we are comfortable.  We like things that are familiar.  We come to have people around us.  We come to see those who are with us and those who are not.  We like all the pieces to fit together.

That said, we also need to be able to be open to how we might look at things through a new lens, how some of the assumptions might not really be all that helpful to us or to others.

Life, I think, is a process of seeing ourselves in relation to everything around us.  But the spirit asks us, over and over again, to be present to the world.  What does that mean?  It has something to do with paying attention to what is around us and always being open to how that perception—that narrative—might evolve and grow and change.

Sometimes that takes us beyond our comfort zones.  It asks us to live not in the place of certainly but in that place of not-knowingness.  That place of seeing something as if we were seeing it for the first time. Children can teach us a lot about that.  They see things and ask questions because they are not bringing all that with them.  But most of all it has to do with being open to what is before us.  And some of it has to do with the way we orient ourselves.

You may have heard the story of the shoe company that sends out two marketing scouts to a remote region of Africa to study the prospect of expanding their business.  One sends back a telegram saying, SITUATION HOPELESS STOP NO ONE WEARS SHOES

The other writes back triumphantly, GLORIOUS BUSINESS OPPORTUNITY STOP THEY HAVE NO SHOES[2]

Life really can be a matter of perspective.  One of our tasks is to be mindful of some of the assumptions we live with, some of the ways that we think but really don’t think about things.

The Buddhist tradition teaches us something about this.  It asks us to always be in the present moment to see what is in front of us.  Whether we are walking or eating an orange or viewing an email, it asks us to be fully in the moment.  It asks that we be mindful.  So simple—and yet so difficult.  To really be aware of what is around us and the patterns that we find ourselves in.  Part of what is so appealing about our patterns is that we don’t have to think about them.  But it is good to think about them.  That is at least the starting place.  How do we see things and what does that tell us about us and how we are in the world?  What might it mean to question some of those assumptions, those questions, those narratives?

We might think of it as starting from scratch over and over again—to look at the ingredients before us and to start from there.  To imagine what might come from what is right there in front of us.  What this particular combination might mean.  It starts with being in the present and seeing the world in its beauty and also its brokenness.  To ask how we might respond in ways we haven’t responded before.

A husband and wife are out for dinner at a Chinese restaurant.  They order their plate of lo mein noodles and are sitting there enjoying it, engrossed in conversation, when a hand reaches down and takes the platter of noodles.  They hear a voice quickly mumble “Sorry!” and look up to see a thin, poorly dressed woman leaving the restaurant with the plate of noodles.

They watch her walk down the street holding the plate in her hand and stuffing noodles into her mouth as quickly as she can.  About this time the owner of the restaurant realizes what has happened and takes off out the front door chasing the noodle thief.  He catches up with her and stands firmly in front of her, blocking her way, and grabbing the side of the plate.  A struggle ensues, the noodles sliding from one side of the plate to the other. The owner finally gets the upper hand and pulls the plate away and the noodles go flying. The woman is left there, empty handed with soggy, contaminated noodles at her feet.  She stands with her arms hung dejectedly at her side.  The owner walks back to the restaurant with the soiled plate in hand, feeling victorious.

The couple gets a new heaping plate of lo mein even though they had eaten more than half of the other plate before it was taken.  Unable to eat any more, they ask if the rest could be boxed up.  They head off to their movie.

A block later, they happen upon the noodle thief.  The woman is hyper-charged.  She simultaneously cried, convulsed, and shouted at a man, who quickly ran away from her. The husband wants to get away as quickly as possible, but his partner didn’t want to do that.  She walks over to the thief and says, “Ah, we haven’t formally met, but about 10 minutes ago you were interested in our noodles.  They gave us some new ones.  Are you still hungry?”

The woman nodded and extended her arms and took the styrofoam container in her hands, bowed ever so slightly and said “Thank you, you’re very kind.”[3]

It is difficult in life, sometimes, to offer what we have when the most comfortable thing would be to keep walking along.  That is often the path of least resistance.

But sometimes it is when we are in that place of the unexpected that we see things in a whole new way.  The spirit is often found in those places that are not what we expect, that are not in that comfort zone but someplace else.  When we are asked to see things that we might take for granted, like good food.  When we see the person before us not as the other but as a person in need and see ourselves in the vulnerability of that other.

The spirit moves in those places of dis-ease and says yes.  You are alive and you are well—just try it.  You have gifts and it is up to you to use them.  We need to orient ourselves in such a way that looks for the possibility that is there.  We can either look at the world in all the ways that it is not likely to work or we can look at the world and imagine how it can work and how we might use our powers well.  To be mindful of the choices we have and to make them with open hearts.  To see life in all of its brokenness and still see there possibility.

Sometimes as a minister I can hear in someone’s story that they know, at least on some level, how they are wanting to move in their lives, what they might be wanting for themselves, what might be evolving.  It might be courage, it might be hope, it might be a more forgiving heart for self or others.  It might be a change in how we live.  But there is sometimes a shift when we actually begin to see it for ourselves.  Sometimes we have to let go of the assumptions we carry about ourselves and the world.  We may need to start from scratch in order to do that.

The poet e.e. cummings once wrote, “we can never be born enough.”  We can never be born enough.  The spirit, over and over again, calls us to new life.  Part of life’s journey is to learn and grow and change—in ways that invite us into more learning and changing and growing.  As I try to focus less on what needs fixing and more on what is right in front of me, on what is good and possible, the world begins to look different.

So back to those resolutions.  It may be that too often we get focused on fixing ourselves or fixing someone else or fixing the world.  Maybe we need to imagine what some new questions might be. 

How can I make myself?

How can I be more compassionate?

How can I be more mindful of gratitude?

What might a new version of the narrative look like?

We are living in times when change is happening.  It is almost frightening how fast change seems to be happening.  And we are being asked to look at our story and how it works or doesn’t work with the larger cultural story.  How are we interdependent?  How much do we really need?  What is most important in our lives?  How are we to be in the world?

We are asked to grow as people and sometimes that growth is in the form of getting rid of what we carry around with us.  To be open to what is in front of us.  To approach life taking nothing for granted.

A Tibetan text puts it like this: “Beneath the pauper’s house there are inexhaustible treasures, but the pauper never realizes this, and the treasures never say, I am here.”[4]

The desire to begin a new year with resolve comes from the awareness that we are arriving every day of our lives.  It comes from the awareness that the world needs us to be present to all of its pain and all of its beauty.

Words of poet David Whyte:

Above the mountains

the Geese turn into

the light again

Painting their

black silhouettes

on an open sky.

Sometimes everything

has to be

enscribed across

the heavens

so you can find

the one line

already written

inside you.

Sometimes it takes

a great sky

to find that

Small, bright

and indescribable

wedge of freedom

in your own heart.

Sometimes with

the bones of the black

sticks left when the fire

has gone out

Someone has written

something new

in the ashes

of your life.

You are not leaving

you are arriving.[5]

What if we looked at the new year—what if we looked at every yes, every day—as an invitation, to be born again and again?  An invitation to start from scratch in how we see the world?

We live in times that ask much of us.  We are asked to be open to what the spirit might be calling us to do—to have courage, and perseverance, and openness.

We are asked to practice how we might be in the world, to live in right relationship with ourselves, with others with the earth.  We may be asked to use our gifts in ways we haven’t used them before.  That will take courage and faith.  But it might also bring freedom.

But what’s amazing is that we are here, we live in times full of challenge and full of promise.  May our lives be full of surprises.  So be it.  Amen.

PRAYER

Spirit of life, hold us this day, hold us this hour, hold us in this moment.  May we be present to this world and its tremendous beauty, its tremendous sorrow, its tremendous calling.  In our seeking, may we find all it is we need to find.  May we live our lives fully. Amen.

BENEDICTION

Resolve to remember that you can never be born enough. In all your days use your gifts to bless the world. Go in love and go in peace. Amen.

[1] Heinz R. Pagels, The Dreams of Reason. New York: Bantam, 1988, pp 163, cited by Zander and Zander, The Art of Possibility, Penguin 2000, pp 11.

[2] Zander and Zander, pp 9.

[3] “Glad to Be Human,” by Kaaren Solveig Anderson, 2000 Skinner House Books, pp 40-42.

[4] “A Heart as Wide as the World” by Sharon Salzberg, 1997 Shambala Publications, pp 4.

[5] http://davidwhyte.bigmindcatalyst.com/cgi/bmc.pl?page=pubpg2.html&node=1041

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Copyright 2008, Rev. Thomas Disrud.  All rights reserved.