“Let It Shine”
Luke 8:26-39
Sanbornton Congregational Church, UCC
June 24, 2007
(Please do not re-print or re-use without permission of the author)
Have you ever wondered how the man described in this scripture passage got that way? In the first century it may have been understood that he was possessed by demons, but in our modern times we know he was probably taken hold by something else – some kind of mental illness that caused him much torment.
Any number of things may have been at the root of his torment – perhaps he suffered the loss of someone dear to him, maybe he witnessed a horrible tragedy, or maybe he grew up in a difficult and painful circumstance of neglect and abuse. We’ll never know.
However you describe it – it is clear that the condition has completely debilitated the man. It has taken him over. He is completely imprisoned. His life energy, his light, his joy, the beauty of who is truly is – is being held captive. Figuratively it might as well be demons. As the scripture says, the man is literally bound with chains.
And so it is that life events can at times paralyze us. Grief, depression, chronic illness – can narrow our world, can make us feel as though paths, doors, possibilities get closed off to us.
Haven’t we all known people, or experienced times in our lives, when a major blow paralyzes us? When we just can’t past it? When illness, loss, tragedy just takes hold of us and we seem to need to repeat its story – over and over? And how we can, like the man in the scripture passage, become imprisoned by a story that will not let us go?
As we celebrate the United Church of Christ’s 50th anniversary, sometimes I think the church is a bit like the man described in the scripture passage – trying to hold in one body competing and diverse voices. Sometimes it feels like the wider Church body is paralyzed from truly shining and acting in the world, of making a difference because we’re working so hard just to hold the Body together.
But the UCC has made a difference and is making a difference. To see this, all we need do is to look at our local church, the Sanbornton Congregational Church, United Church of Christ.
This church, more than 10 years ago, bravely set forth on a journey to explore a resolution made by the General Synod of the United Church of Christ to be an Open and Affirming denomination. As you may know, the General Synod can only make recommendations to local churches, not demand anything from them. This church, however, chose to embark on a process of study, discernment and discussion. Some of us remember. Some of us remember the process as a difficult and painful time. Mistakes were made. Hurtful words were said – some, right here in this sanctuary. Some people left unable to support how this process was unfolding.
As a way to honor that difficult time, we are not waving banners or flying balloons.
And yet, the resolution passed - it is a beautiful statement of God’s inclusive love for all people and it is printed on your bulletin.
As I have been reflecting on this church’s journey of being an open and affirming church for 10 years – it seems to me that some of us are still grieving that difficult time. And when you think about it, the process did bring out all kinds of grief.
The church experienced a loss of innocence – that the fragile harmony of community could be so painful disrupted by divisiveness and disagreement.
Each person who went through it – no matter what view they held - experienced a kind of grieving – that their viewpoint could not be seen, or shared, or understood by others in the community – people with whom they worshipped and cared for.
There has been grief over real or perceived changes; and grief over those who left the church or moved on.
It is important to honor our grieving. Yet it is also important not to allow grieving to keep us stuck from moving forward, paralyzed in time; imprisoned by the past.
When I shared our church’s story with a colleague; she told me that the following memory came to mind.
When she was a young girl, she suffered a ruptured appendix and needed to be rushed to the hospital. She almost died. She told me that for years she obsessed about the ugly scar that the surgery left on her body. It hasn’t been until very recently, years later, that she finally realized that if it were not for the scar – she would not be here. The scar is the reason she is still alive.
And so it is for our church. Can we embrace – that no matter how much we may regret the difficulty of the past – the beauty of the new life that our church is experiencing? Can we celebrate that it is this very difficulty that is the source of our growth?
Can we forgive the past and let it go? Can we embrace who we have become and are becoming? Can we embrace that this church’s courageous journey has been an inspiration, a source of hope, a beacon of light for many of the people who have come through our doors and entered covenant with us?
Can we finally, set ourselves free? Can we finally take our light out from under the bushel basket of grief and start really living, start really shining – in all of our diversity while still honoring the ways in which we differ?
Returning to our scripture reading – I have always found this reading, this healing to be tremendously moving. For it is Jesus who finally sets the man free from all that has tormented him, all that has kept him bound up in chains, all that has prevented him from living the precious life he was born to live. And whether it happened this way exactly or not, what the story conveys is how much POWER his torment had over him. We see it in the physical representation of the demons being released into the swine - a legion of them, 5000 strong and their mad rush into the sea. The power now unleashed to allow the man to be free to live. And although the man begged to go with Jesus, Jesus said to him – “Return to your home, and declare how much God has done for you.”
And so, the question is before us – as a local church and as part of the wider church, the United Church of Christ – what is it that we will do, as Mary Oliver says, with our one “wild and precious life?” Will we remain bound by the past? Or will we allow Jesus to set us free; to live gratefully into the new life we have been given – so that we can truly, joyously, let our love, our light, SHINE. And I mean, REALLY SHINE!!
Let us pray,
Gracious God,
Release us dear God. Release us from the stories of the past that keep our light under a bushel, that keep us paralyzed from moving forward, that keep us from living life in to the full as Jesus called us to do. Help us to take to heart, the beautiful words by Mary Oliver…
“When it’s over, I want to say: all my life
I was a bride married to amazement.
I was a bridegroom taking the world into my arms.
When it’s over, I don’t want to wonder
if I have made of my life something particular, and real.
I don’t want to find myself sighing and frightened
or full of argument.
I don’t want to end up simply having visited this world.” (“When Death Comes “– by Mary Oliver)
By your grace, dear God, help us to embrace all we have become and all we are yet to become. Let us embrace the new life you have given us. Help us to let it shine. Amen.
