Following Jesus Today II: "Soul Repair"
Christ offers peace: The decision to take it is ours.
Sermon Preached by
The Rev. Dr. Andrew Stirling
Sunday, September 22, 2002
Texts: Luke 9:23; 10:2-9
On a very hot day this past summer, in an attempt to cool off, I went into a shopping mall. Midway up the escalator I realized I had done something to myself. When I got to the top, sure enough, I had ripped the heel off my shoe and it was going round and round in the escalator. Not knowing quite what to do, and walking as if I was somewhat inebriated, I tried to find a shoe repair place. I asked a number of people where one was until finally a woman pointed me down an obscure little alley in the mall and sure enough, to my great delight, there was a shoe repair store.
I hobbled in and told the man (I don't think they call them cobblers anymore) my story of woe. Could he do anything about it? He said: "Oh yes, we're used to doing this sort of thing for women! I will gladly try to repair the heel of your shoe." Clearly I was not alone in this moment of distress, because he had two great big leather seats there for people to sit down while their shoes were being fixed.
I sat down with a great degree of relief, picked up a magazine and relaxed. Within a matter of seconds, however, two young people rushed in, invading the quietness. Clearly these two young people, from their exuberance and their accents, were from the West Indies. I listened very carefully to them as they spoke and I thought they were from Jamaica but wasn't certain. They looked around with great enthusiasm at this store that had nothing more in it than insoles, corn pads, shoelaces and a few different things for removing scuff marks from shoes. They were even excited by this.
I realized immediately that these two young people were part of World Youth Day. They had on their backpacks; they had bandannas around their necks and they had that ubiquitous badge that these young people wore. Their enthusiasm for this store was overwhelming and completely, I thought, strange. They started to laugh and touch everything, really enjoying themselves. Then one of them said: "You know, this is the kind of store that we've been looking for."
The other one said: "Absolutely. The store is called 'Sole Repair.'"
The two of them then started to look at the rest of the merchandise. I couldn't resist and I said, "Excuse me, I'd love to talk with you for a moment.".
"By all means," they said, and they both sat down in the chair in front of me. I began to tell them that Timothy Eaton Memorial Church had had the cross for the World Youth Day and they started to open up and, as I suspected, they were from a place I'd visited and played cricket in years ago, named Mandeville, in Jamaica.
The three of us had the most glorious conversation. They told their story of how they came to Canada, to this World Youth Day, I was deeply touched by what they had to say. They were two young people from a very, very poor community. It was their parish in Mandeville that had paid for them to come to World Youth Day and to cover all their expenses.
As they talked about their experience that morning in the shopping mall, it was very evident that they had never been in such a place before in their lives. They were excited by the Orange Julius machines, they were excited by the ramps and the escalators, by the lights on the ceiling, and they were even excited in a shoe repair store with laces and corn pads. They told me that they weren't able to buy anything while they were in the mall, for the money that their parish had given them was simply to pay their expenses and they didn't have a penny more. But they told me that they really didn't care, they simply enjoyed being here, worshipping their Lord, and being part of the event.
I was deeply moved by these two young people. Once I'd got the heel back on my shoe, I went out and realized that there were others from World Youth Day walking around that mall. And I thought of the words of warning from Jesus. He said: "What profiteth a man if he gains the whole world and loses his soul?" You see, these young people were demonstrating the exact opposite. They thought they had the whole world because they had their souls.
The word "soul" is translated in many different ways throughout the Bible. It finds its origins in a word called "nephesh" in the Old Testament. And there is a development through the Bible about the understanding of "soul" as the people of Israel moved from their original Semitic roots and encountered the Greek world; it takes on a more full-bodied meaning. Originally it meant simply, "your life, yourself, who you are." But it took on a sort of immortal sense as it entered the Greek world. (That part that lives on in the human life, even beyond the grave, that which constitutes your immortal self).
When Jesus uses the word, I think he means the totality of life, the totality of who we are and the life that we have been given by God. So, it's not just losing that immortal self, it is not just losing your physical life, it is the totality of your being, as a human created in the image of God. So Jesus says to the disciples, "What profiteth a person if they gain the whole world and lose their soul? It profiteth you nothing." And these young people demonstrated the exact opposite. They had this life. You could see it, you could feel it within them. They didn't care whether they could buy anything in the mall that day. They had something that was greater. They had this sense of the fellowship and the power of God's spirit, of worship, of community and the enthusiasm of being with those of a like mind and spirit.
My friends, I think there are many people in our world today with souls in need of healing. People who have lost all sense of perspective, all sense of the power and the grace of God and have been wrapped up in those other things for which they are willing to sell their souls, but which do not bring life. I refer to this (if I might use the same imagery of sole repair) as people who have thin souls, who are vulnerable - people whose lives are fragile and on the edge.
The other text from the Gospel of Luke speaks precisely to a generation that has a thin soul, because Jesus sent out his disciples into that world, just as he sends you and I as Christians out into that world. He did so then by saying, "I don't want you to take anything with you. All I want you to do is when you go out two-by-two, when you enter a house, you are to say, 'Peace be in this house.'"
The disciples who did that understood that at the heart of Jesus' ministry is a ministry of peace to the soul, to the lives of men and women. From the very beginning in the Gospel of Luke, when the angels proclaimed, "Glory to God in the highest and on earth peace," when Jesus in John's Gospel took the disciples to one side and said: "These things I say unto you that you might have peace," to the greeting of the early Christians, "grace, mercy and peace," peace has been an integral part of the Christian message. Jesus wanted his disciples to go into the world with this message, "Peace be in this house." I think that there are many people, at an individual and at a corporate level, who are crying out for the peace that only Christ can offer in their lives.
This past week I did a very strange thing. I rushed home for five o'clock so I could tune into the Dr. Phil show. Dr. Phil is this new guy on the block who is giving psychological and personal advice to people (he used to be on the Oprah Winfrey show, I believe). He's a very winsome and charismatic character, and I must admit I kind of like the guy, but one of the things I noticed as I watched the program (actually for two consecutive evenings) was that people are able to phone in and present their problems.
When I reduced those people's call down to one thing, it seemed to me that what they are in search of is some peace in their lives. Whether it is the peace that comes from mending broken relationships, the peace they need because their bodies need healing, or the peace they need because of the anxiety and uncertainty of their lives, everybody seems to be wanting a simple answer and wanting peace. Phil, God bless him, is really good at addressing these people - with one great big exception: He does not give them the real source of peace, the peace that comes from a relationship with God in Jesus Christ. That is what was missing in what he offered.
What is obvious is that there are many people out there whose souls are thin and fragile. This very same week I turned on Canada AM and listened to children being interviewed about the stresses of life at school. I heard two teenagers talk about the problems of the double cohort, where twice the number of young people are going to be graduating next year, thus doubling the competition to get into university or college or to get a good job. Young people are living under the most enormous stress, because they desire to have something in their lives that they can rely on.
Similarly, I listened to a senior citizen being interviewed, who because of the decline in the stock market has found that the money he has coming in on a monthly basis has been reduced. What he had relied on as a source and solidity for his life is evaporating before him. One woman in our congregation told me when she got her investment statement last month, she thought that she would be able to retire in the year 2080. She is now 73!
That is the kind of impact that people feel in their lives. People feel a profound sense of stress and that stress is compounded when their values and their belief systems are predicated purely on materialism or success or greed and they have no other point of reference. Jesus was absolutely right! "What profiteth a person if they gain the whole world and lose their soul?" If they lose their selves and people can lose their selves when they forget about God.
It's also there at the corporate level, and by the corporate level I mean the collective level. Similarly to running into those two Jamaicans who were full of enthusiasm, I also ran into two young Koreans at the Shepherd subway station with their backpacks on and so on. I started to talk to them once again, and applauded the fact that their soccer team had just played extremely well in the World Cup and they'd been really successful. I highlighted a couple of their great players and said how fantastic they were and how impressed I was. They were delighted that I knew about soccer and a little about their country and began to talk, but as one of them talked about her life and about her family, tears welled up. She said: "I really appreciate you applauding my soccer team playing so well." She told me that many in her grandmother's family live not in South Korea, but North and, had never seen their relatives in the South. And she said, "You know, it's terrible living with ideologies that divide us, with a border that divides us. Only when the two teams can play as one will I really be able to rejoice."
Here was a young woman who felt the thin soul of the world in which we live, the thin soul of conflict. As she was speaking, my mind went back to many years ago when I lived in South Africa. One night a group of us had tickets to the Nico Malan Theatre in Cape Town. We went in to hear performances of various largos, Telemann, Mozart and Bach. Beautiful, soothing, serene music: It was an evening to behold. We had all dressed up and gone out for dinner, and then we had a balm for our souls as we listened to this music. Then we came out to the cool Cape Town night and got into our cars and switched on the radios and heard that three young people had been killed by a car bomb just a few miles away.
Oh, we were trying to find peace through the beautiful music of Telemann, but we needed a deeper peace. A peace that is needed and understood when we appreciate and understand that life itself is precious. For what profiteth a person or a group or a nation if they gain the whole world and they lose their lives? My friends, I think the gospel message that Jesus gave to his disciples, when he said go house to house and say, "Peace be in this house," is not often heard or appreciated in this world.
I read a delightful story about a woman who went to church and came home to find a robber in her living room. She didn't know what to do, with the robber staring at her and she staring at the robber, so she quoted Scripture. She said: "Acts 2:38, 'repent and believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved.'"
The man just stood there, paralyzed. The woman was ecstatic. "Wow," she thought. "I never understood the power of Scripture!"
Finally, with the man continuing to just stand there, she went to a phone and called the police. When they arrived, they said to her, "How on earth were you able to do this?"
She said: "I just quoted Scripture."
"Wow," said the police officer, "That's amazing! Incredible!"
They asked the robber why he just stood there frozen like that, and he said: "I thought she said 'I have an axe and two 38s.'"
My friends, I often feel the world doesn't hear the word of peace in Scripture very clearly, but it needs to be heard. Just as simple as it was for those disciples to take nothing with them but their belief in the One who sent them, so we must go into the world with "Peace be in this house." I believe that it is precisely that peace that can heal torn souls. And I do so because I believe that it starts, as Jesus instructed his disciples, with our desire for peace with humanity. Jesus did not send his disciples out to enforce people to live in peace, but to make an appeal.
The great Ramsey MacDonald, a former Prime Minister of England, who was a great devoté of peace, was once criticized by a backbencher. The backbencher said: "Just because, Mr. MacDonald, you desire peace, does not mean that peace will be produced. So why do you keep on with it?"
He replied: "You are quite right, sir. Just as the desire for food does not mean that you are going to cease to be hungry, but it causes you to take the first step towards a restaurant."
You see, my friends, the gospel of Jesus Christ is not a gospel of success, it is a gospel of faithfulness. It does not mean that you do not say to the world "Peace be with you," in the thought that it will always be received. On the contrary. In the Book of Genesis, Chapter Eight, when Noah sent a dove out over the waters to find out if the dove could alight on dry land, the dove came back. For indeed, the world was still a dangerous place. And the dove of peace, with the olive branch in its mouth, comes from the story of Noah.
Jesus sent his disciples out into the world knowing that people might not accept the peace that they offered, but emphasizing that first and foremost they must offer it. I do not know, you do not know, whether Saddam Hussein, for example, is going to seize the opportunity for peace. He's a fool if he doesn't. But he may not. Just as that dove went out over the waters came back without a place to land. First you have to offer it. First you have to believe that that is the plea of the Christian and then you go from there. For the disciples it was to shake the dust off their feet, to move on to another community. But first you offer it: "Peace be in this house." Then it is on the heads of those who accept it or reject it.
There is also a profound sense in which having peace in relationships with one another is only part of the way. The full way, the real answer, is peace with God. The Apostle Paul put this beautifully, "Therefore, having our faith in Jesus Christ, we have peace with God." Everything ultimately starts with that fundamental relationship. That relationship (and I will never be able to stress it enough) is something that begins with God and not with us! The peace of the Kingdom is God's initiative. It is Christ's initiative. It is the Cross.
What those young people who gathered on World Youth Day and came into that store knew and appreciated is that their souls are repaired not on the basis of anything that they themselves are doing, but on the basis of what God has done for them. I saw this so beautifully illustrated some years ago while on a private tour of Parliament Hill. It was one of the most beautiful days that I can remember. I asked the Commissioner afterwards if he had any unusual stories about people who had visited Parliament Hill and the Peace Tower.
"Have I got stories for you!" He said and proceeded to tell me the story of a young boy, no more than nine years old, who came up to him one day and asked if he worked there. The Commissioner said: "Yes, I do."
"I was wondering if I could buy the Peace Tower," the boy asked.
The Commissioner replied, "I really don't think so."
The young boy said: "Well, I have 34 cents that my mother gave me."
The Commissioner said: "I really don't think you can afford the Peace Tower."
The boy rummaged around in his pockets and found another quarter and said: "I've also got this, now is this enough for me to buy the Peace Tower?"
And the Commissioner finally sat the boy down and said to him: "Young man, you could never afford the Peace Tower, if you have 34 cents or 34 million dollars, you can't afford the Peace Tower. It is not for sale."
He then asked: "Are you a Canadian?"
And the boy said: "Yes, I am sir. I'm from Sarnia, Ontario."
The Commissioner said: "Well, in that case, if you're a Canadian, it's already yours. All you have to do is practise it. The peace."
My friends, that is the peace of Jesus Christ. There is no cost to it. It is not something that we can purchase. It is ours, and it is ours by faith. It is more valuable than anything else we can buy in the whole world. For what profiteth a person if they gain the whole world and lose themselves? But our selves are found by Jesus Christ. May peace be in this house, may peace be in your houses, may peace be in this world. Through Christ, Amen.
This is a verbatim transcription of the original sermon.