A few years ago, Lutheran Brotherhood came out with a series
of books called “Life Discoveries”. Each of the seven booklets is
meant for people to reflect on their lives at different points. They provide
little writing assignments and exercises to guide that reflection. One is for
newlyweds, encouraging them to write a mission statement. Another is called
“Seventh Inning Stretch” which is meant for time as the kids are leaving
home and it’s time to be thinking towards retirement. They’re good
little booklets and it would be fun to use them here at church in some context.
The last of these little booklets is called “Living and Leaving a Legacy”.
Now we usually think of legacy in terms of passing on a monetary inheritance
but the exercises in this book encourage us to think about what spiritual legacy
we might pass on. What values, beliefs, hopes and dreams are important to me
that I hope I have been able to share and to communicate to those who will receive
this legacy. The format for these legacy statements begins with a preamble of
faith. One sample preamble is from Elsie. She writes, “Before I was forty
years old, I just believed in something greater than myself. Then, I began to
know God through Jesus Christ because of some ongoing conversations I’ve
had with a parish pastor in my community. At seventy one this faith is my most
precious gift.” Ann and Richard write in their preamble of faith “We’ve
talked about how for many years, we lived the faith of our parents. We went
to church, called ourselves Christians because these things had always been
a part of our lives. Then, we experienced some tragedy in our lives and we got
older. The faith seeds of our parents matured. We now know that it is our faith
that has given us staying power and meaning. Between ourselves, we talk about
how it took us sixty years to feel a childlike faith.”
It’s clear to me that what we’ve got in our lesson
this morning from Paul’s letter to the Philippians is a legacy statement.
We know that when Paul wrote this he was sitting in prison and awaiting trial.
There was no way to know how that trial might go but he seems not to be troubled
by it. He is writing to the congregation at Philippi. Philippi is probably the
first congregation he started and it is apparent in the letter that they too
have suffered persecution for the faith. So Paul is reflecting on the legacy
he wants to leave to the church at Philippi and is beginning with this “Preamble
of Faith.” It is interesting how the preambles samples began with how the
writers “used” to think. Sort of a before and after shot.
So too, Paul considers how he used to think. “If anyone else has reason
to be confident in the flesh, I have more… "Mirror, Mirror on the
Wall, Who is most righteous of them all?" Paul's name was at the top of
the list. Paul is haunted by the same troubling questions that we often consider.
What is the purpose of life? "What am I living for?" How do we measure
the success and failure of living? Have we done the right thing for the wrong
reason? How do we "earn our keep?" What are the things of importance
in life and how much of the rest of the stuff would we be willing to give up
to get that which is good?
So often those questions boil down to the question of what
must I do to be saved? What is expected of me to receive the "well done
good and faithful servant" from God? According to the real life version
of the game Paul was playing, he was way ahead. He was a born Jew, circumcised
on the 8th day according to the Law. Not only born into the covenant people,
but his ancestors come from the tribe of Benjamin, one of the old first families,
and they still spoke Hebrew at home. And it wasn't all just a matter of being
born in the right family. He had gone to the finest schools and been educated
as a Pharisee. His zeal for the Kingdom of God had taken him into the leadership
of the persecution of all who opposed the Jewish faith. He knew the law. He
kept the law. He's got a straight "A" in righteousness, blameless
before the Law of Moses. Mirror, Mirror on the wall, who is most righteous of
them all? Well, Saul of Tarsus holds the number one spot.
But so far for Paul it’s “all about me” isn’t it? It’s
all about me. The other week at Rally day while out on the parking lot Jan Kalb
was telling me that Erika was sick with mono. My son Jon came up just then and
I told him Erika was sick, What, He said, I won’t have anybody to talk
to at church. “It’s all about me, isn’t it? It’s all about
me!” Paul is “all about me. His before picture can’t see anything
further than what his pedigree is, what he has done, how he has lived. His before
picture is “All about me!”
But now we get the “after” shot. Like our earlier
faith preambles…that was how I used to think but…Here is Paul saying
that all of the things he had counted on to make him acceptable to God, to earn
him a spot in God's Hall of Fame, he counts now as worthless. Everything that
he looked at to give him standing and value as a human being before God, he
now says is nothing but trash, rubbish, to be thrown out in order that he might
receive and enjoy the grace of God given in Jesus Christ. All the stuff he counted
on to establish his own righteousness, he rejects in order to have righteousness
whose source is God and whose basis is faith. He has turned his back on all
of the proud achievements and privileges of his past and yet he seems to be
laughing and rejoicing in his newfound relationship with God.
Paul is saying, It’s not about me, it’s not about
how good a person I’ve been, or what I’ve accomplished, or what awards
and rewards I’ve gotten. It’s not even about how much I’ve sacrificed,
how much I’ve given up. It’s just not about me. Paul says, “More
than that, I regard everything as loss because of the surpassing value of knowing
Christ Jesus my Lord. The legacy he leaves is that through him might others
come to see and know Christ. His hope is that in seeing Paul, others might see
the grace of God extended through Jesus Christ.
The story is told of a time when two spiritual giants were
to appear together on a national T.V show. Retired archbishop Dom Helda Camara
of Brazil and Mother Teresa were scheduled to have 15 minutes together on a
particular talk show.
As they waited in the green room for their turn to appear they talked about
the allure of the camera and how to protect themselves from the seduction of
fame. So together they prayed a prayer of Cardinal Newman that includes these
words: "Lord Jesus...Don't extinguish the light of your presence within
me. O Lord, look through my eyes, listen through my ears, speak through my lips,
walk with my feet....For, to the degree that others notice me, it is a sign
that I am, unfortunately, still opaque and not transparent." Archbishop
Camera ended with "Take away whatever is opaque in us, O Lord, and help
us become transparent." (Sojourners, Dec. 1987)
If you crawl under a choir stall of many Gothic Cathedrals
in Europe you will find there the carved letters "AMDG." They will
be hewn in the stone and etched in the stained glass. The letters stand for
Ad Majorem Dei Gloriam: To the Honor and Glory of God. This, instead of the
artist's name. Many artists spent their entire lives working in one cathedral,
and yet that is the mark they left behind rather than their own names.
That is the theme of Paul in this passage, to let go of other
goals and values and focus on the one goal of knowing and serving Christ. With
uncharacteristic modesty Paul acknowledges, “Not that I have already obtained
this or have already reached the goal, but I press on to make it my own, because
Christ Jesus has made me his own. …Forgetting what lies behind and straining
forward to what lies ahead I press on toward the goal for the prize of the heavenly
call of God in Christ Jesus.”
The analogy of the race is a good one. Races make for good stories. .. /a true story from the Olympics. It’s October 20, 1968. The last of the men marathoners arrive in Mexico City Olympic Stadium. The winner had crossed the finish line over an hour earlier. But as the last spectators are getting ready to leave, a lone figure, that of John Stephen Akhwari, of Tanzania, comes into view at the end of the 26 miles, 385 yard event. His leg is bloodied and bandaged from a fall that he had taken at about the half way mark. He hobbled around the final 400-yard track and crosses the finish line. The crowd stands and applaudes as if he were the winner. Afterwards someone asks him why he had endangered his leg by not quitting. He replies, "My country did not send me 7,000 miles to start the race. They sent me 7,000 miles to finish it." So Paul presses on for God has called him not to start the race, not to run the race better than anyone else, but to finish it. Paul becomes transparent as we see Christ working within him. May our legacy be such that others may see Christ’s presence and work in our lives.
Amen.