MUMC Sermon-03/12/2006

So are you thoroughly confused yet? Are you wondering why we are reading Advent/Christmas texts in the middle of Lent? Trust me, there’s a point to it, but more on that later.

I recently finished Doris Kearns Goodwin’s latest book, Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln. It’s a moving account of how our 16^th president was able to form the most diverse and arguably strongest cabinet in the history of our country. After winning the general election of 1860, Lincoln invited into his cabinet his three opponents for the Republican nomination; and not only did he name them to his cabinet, he gave them the three most prominent positions — Secretary of State, Secretary of the Treasury and Attorney General. These four men were not friends, they were bitter rivals, and each of Lincoln’s former adversaries believed they were more qualified for the Presidency than the man who ultimately defeated them.

Goodwin’s book explores the political astuteness of Lincoln, and how he managed to capitalize on the strengths of his rivals for the greater good of the country at the most difficult time in our nation’s history. How was he able to do it?

Here is how Goodwin describes Lincoln’s personality in contrast to two of his rivals for the presidential nomination, William H. Seward and Salmon P. Chase: “Lincoln’s early intimacy with tragic loss reinforced a melancholy temperament. Yet his familiarity with pain and personal disappointment imbued him with a strength and understanding of human frailty unavailable to a man of Seward’s buoyant disposition. Moreover, Lincoln, unlike the brooding Chase, possessed a life-affirming humor and a profound resilience that lightened his despair and fortified his will.” (p. 49)

Goodwin’s description demonstrates something I’ve long believed, namely, that joy and pain come out of the same place in the human soul. The person who has never experienced deep pain — who is, to reverse the words of Isaiah, “unacquainted with grief” — is probably incapable of real joy; joy for which “happiness” is a poor imitation.[1]

We live in a culture inure to grief. We all know something of it, but in reality we work hard at shielding ourselves from its impact. We don’t dwell on it. “Get over it,” we’re told. “Move on and don’t let it get to you.” And so we think we’ve moved on, but in reality that grief is always present, close to the surface, awaiting our appropriate attention to it.

A few years ago a man sat in my office wanting to discuss the irreparable rift that had taken place in his marriage. Married for almost twenty years, the couple had reached the point of no return. As he told the story of their years together he mused aloud, “I just don’t know where it went wrong. After we lost our son things were never the same.”

I had known the couple for some time, but in the years that I knew them not once had they mentioned the tragic loss of their son. I was shocked, and asked him to tell me what had happened. After recounting the story I asked him how he and his wife dealt with the loss. “We never talked about it again after the first few months. Occasionally we would mention him on the anniversary or his birthday, but I always felt it was better not to dwell on it. We needed to move on. I went back to work after a week or so and figured it was better to go on with it. I loved that boy; a part of me died with him. But I had to go on.”

I cannot fathom the pain of losing a child. Everyone who has gone through such an ordeal handles the pain in their own way, and how most are able to recover is a testament to the strength of the human spirit. Yet, when thinking about the man sitting in my office I can’t help but conclude that what his marriage needed was a way of adequately acknowledging such a great loss. Moving on, getting over it, not dwelling on it only made moving on, getting over it, and not dwelling on it impossible.

Lincoln and his wife Mary lost two sons, one at the age of three and a second died in the White House at age 11. It was this kind of familiarity with pain and grief, not to mention the hardship of his own childhood, which formed Lincoln’s melancholy temperament and his life-affirming humor.

There is a fine line between dwelling on something so as to remain victimized by life, and dwelling on something so as to enable one to more fully embrace the fullness of life. It’s really a matter of perspective. We all know people who dwell on their pain and on their loss so as to remain paralyzed or, even worse, so as to wallow in their loss and the anger that often accompanies it. Yet, perhaps you know others who have gone through great adversity and loss, and in taking full account of it they are able to reach out and identify with others in their pain. They possess a compassion and empathy that can only come from a place of intimacy with tragedy and grief. In their pain they are able to move beyond themselves, and they exert a nobility of spirit that only a few of us possess. There are some of you sitting here today that I would place in that esteemed category.

Greg Jones, the Dean of Duke University Divinity School, said that Lincoln combined “a deep awareness of the world’s brokenness with a profound energy to be an agent of it’s mending…Lincoln learned that the only way to survive was through the suffering, not by trying to evade, deny or flee it.”[2] I was reminded of that this week when Marianne shared with me the poetry some of her students recently composed. In their poetic reflections I was reminded of what Aristotle, Poe and others argued — that there is a close connection between the melancholic and the beautiful. As these adolescents reflected on their lives, their families, and growing up in the Bronx, they already knew what Lincoln also knew, that the only way to survive was through the suffering, not by trying to evade, deny or flee it.

Recently one of you responded to me when I asked you how you were by saying, “Do you really want to know? If you really want to know I’ll tell you, otherwise just tell me that you’re simply being polite.” When I responded that I did really want to know, my conversation partner said, “I’m not doing well.” And the temptation for most us is to ignore what we are really enduring, to overlook what is actually happening in our relationships, to pretend our pain isn’t really there and to smile to a world that doesn’t seem to care or want to know the truth. But this morning I want to encourage you to dwell, to take a deep look and to know that you will survive not by evading or pretending, but by living through it. And that’s hard. It’s painful, not only for you, but those with whom you share life. Let’s not pretend otherwise. But the promise of the gospel, the wisdom of the great poets and authors and leaders teach us that if we live through our pain, we will eventually move beyond ourselves and our pain will become the source of someone else’s hope.

And that’s the point, isn’t it? Today in word and song we’re encouraged to see that even our most difficult circumstances hold out the promise of redemption and hope. That doesn’t mean by any stretch of the imagination that we should seek out suffering in some masochistic way, or that one should dwell in a morose or self-pitying sense of victimization. After all, Lincoln’s leadership was distinguished by strength of character, humility and a profound commitment to the good of the country and its people.[3]

There’s something very Lenten about all this. At a time in the church’s year when we focus on Jesus’ suffering, we’re called not to see our pain as something worth avoiding or even as some aberration; rather, we’re called to see in it the capacity to share so deeply in the brokenness of the world that we become a part of its mending. Isn’t that what Israel is reminded of over and over again in the Old Testament. “Remember that you were once slaves in Egypt,” the bible often reads, “therefore deal kindly and generously with the alien, the widow, and the poor in your midst.” In other words, use the pain of life in some way to mend the brokenness of the world around you.

That’s Mary’s example, isn’t it? She is asked to do the impossible, to bear a burden so great we cannot even understand it. We’ve turned her story into a precious story about a baby and his mommy, but the truth is that the story is more complicated than that. This news would put her life in danger; it could bring humiliation and shame upon her and her family; and it would certainly lead to even more pain and grief for her later in life. But Mary chose to understand her new situation as a new lens, perhaps as a set of new eyes to see the world. Through her own pain, and eventually the pain of her son, Mary was able to understand the pain and suffering of others.

As a matter of fact, if Jennifer had kept reading from Luke’s gospel earlier, it would not have taken her long to reach the rest of Mary’s response to her circumstances. Soon she reveals the depth of her compassion, when she bursts forth in song: “My soul magnifies the Lord; my spirit rejoices in God my savoir for he has looked with favour on the lowliness of his servant. lifted up the lowly…he has filled the hungry with good things…He has helped his servant Israel, remembering to be merciful, and fulfilled the promise he made to our ancestors.”

It takes a strong person to see life in this way, but I know some who do. As I said to her earlier, some of them are sitting here today. Their own struggles haven’t hardened them or made them bitter; in fact, their pain has made them more compassionate, more gentle, more capable of seeing pain and grief around them. That is the epitome of what it means to love our neighbors as ourselves.

Friends, think about your own life. Who in your family needs you to see in a new way? Who at work needs you to be more compassionate? Where do you see suffering, and pain and grief each day?

As we begin to answer those questions, we will discover, I promise you, the depth of true joy, for joy and grief are intimately connected. As we live through our pain and eventually, in due time, move beyond ourselves, we will take part in the mending of the world. And we will find ourselves singing in hope with Mary the words of our hymn: “My heart shall sing of the day you bring. Let the fires of your justice burn. Wipe all away all tears, for the dawn draws near, and the world is about to turn!”

[1] James Harnish. As written in his weekly congregation email on March 10, 2006.

[2] Greg Jones. “Melancholy Leaders” in The Christian Century, February 21, 2006, p. 47.

[3] Ibid.