A Fourth Church Sermon by Joanna M. Adams

November 28, 2002 | Thanksgiving Day

The Main Thing

Joanna M. Adams
Pastor, Fourth Presbyterian Church

Psalm 67
Revelation 7:9–12
Luke 17:11–19

“Then one of them, when he saw that he was healed,
turned back, praising God with a loud voice.”

Luke 17:15 (NRSV)

Since we do not live by bread alone, O God, but from every word that comes from you, we ask that you would open our hearts and minds to receive the nourishment and truth that leads to everlasting life. We offer our prayer in the power of the Holy Spirit and for the sake of Christ our Lord. Amen.

It is wonderful for Al and me to share our first Thanksgiving in Chicago with all of you this morning.

I am remembering a story a friend in Atlanta told me years ago about the time his daughter had graduated from college. He wanted to give her a very special graduation present. She was naturally expecting something along the lines of a new car. He, however, being the college professor he was, decided to give her something much more meaningful. He gave her a framed copy of a Yiddish poem translated into English. She tried to be nice about it. She read the poem. She looked at her dad. She read the poem again, and then she said, “I just don’t get it.” Years have passed, and the father keeps asking the daughter if she has figured out her college graduation present. “Dad,” she says, “I still don’t get it.”

And he says to her, “The day will come when you will understand the meaning of the gift I gave you long ago.”

Let me read the poem to you. I wish I could read it in Yiddish, but if I did, you couldn’t understand it. The title of the poem is “The Main Thing.”

If your outlook on things has changed,
This is not the main thing.
If you feel like laughing at old dreams,
This is not the main thing.
If you recall errors of which you are now ashamed,
This is not the main thing.
Even if you know that what you are doing now, you will regret some other time,
This is not the main thing.
But beware lightheartedly to conclude from this
That there is no such thing as the main thing.

What do you think is the main thing in life? Perhaps the story of the ten lepers from the Gospel of Luke will illumine the mystery a bit this Thanksgiving morning. Go back with me to that unnamed village in the border region between Galilee and Samaria. It seems far away from where we are today, and yet, if one accepts the idea that geography can be spiritual as well as physical, then it seems that all of us are living today in what could be called “border country.” We are in that peculiar place between that which used to be—and which was relatively predictable and solid around us and beneath our feet—and a future that is more uncertain than perhaps it has been in our lifetime. War with Iraq looms on the horizon. The economy, global and national, is uncertain. Terrorist attacks remain a significant anxiety. I have recently flown several times on ATA, and for some reason my ticket is always marked “Security!” Every time I go to the airport, I am entirely searched three different times. We live in uncertain times. Call it border country. Nowhere is it more essential to have clarity about what the main thing is than out on the margins of things.

There is an interesting map on display in the British Museum in London. It is an old mariner’s map drawn up in 1525. It outlines the coast of North America and adjacent waters. The cartographer had made notations on the areas of the map that had not yet been explored. This was a long time before even the pilgrims landed. The cartographer wrote across the unknown territory “Here be giants” and the in another part of the map “Here be scorpions” and then over here “Here be dragons.” The map eventually came into the possession of a man named John Franklin. He scratched out those fearful inscriptions and wrote across the map of the unknown territory “Here be God.” (1) A wonderful reminder to us today as we think about the unknown tomorrow. What ’ere betide, God will be there, full of mercy and compassion and sovereignty.

That was exactly the way it was the day a band of outcasts there in the border region between Galilee and Samaria approached Jesus. They had heard that, in a way no one could explain, God was present in this person, that he possessed a power that was not of this world. They needed that kind of power. Modern medicine would describe their condition as Hansen’s Disease, but that is entirely too tame a definition for what the ten suffered. They were in a state of distress in every imaginable way. Not only were they chronically ill, they were deemed ritually unclean by the religious establishment of the day. Indeed, according to the law of Leviticus, “a leper is required to wear loose clothing and let his hair be uncut, and he is to walk wherever he walks with his hand above his lip, shouting to everyone who approaches, “Unclean! Unclean!” (Leviticus 13:45). As I read this week that almost 40 million people around the world are infected with HIV/AIDS, I remembered what a terrible thing it is when people are stigmatized and branded as unclean, untouchable, unworthy of concern.

When the lepers summoned what little hope was left in them and cried out to Jesus, “Master, have mercy on us!” Jesus responded immediately, “Go and show yourselves to the priest.” As they went, they were made clean. (Only a priest could officially declare someone who had been unclean as cured and released from banishment.) (2)

Listen to the way Luke tells the story, “As they went, they were made clean.” In other words, healing occurs in the course of their obedience. (3) I love that. As best you can, do what you believe Jesus is telling you to do. Obey him, whether it makes a bit of sense to you or not. In the course of your obedience, genuine healing can take place. Obedience to what you truly believe God is calling you to be and do: that is close to the main thing. That leads to the main thing, but obedience is not the main thing.

All ten were healed, but only one knew the path to that which is most essential in human existence. The tenth leper, the Samaritan, the outsider, came back and praised God with a loud voice. In case you are a little rusty on your first-century prejudices, I will simply say that the Samaritan was considered to be neither a Jew nor a Gentile but an aberration that neither Jew nor Gentile considered to be worthy of the time of day. It is to the most unlikely person that Jesus gave his fullest blessing. All ten were healed, and no doubt, the other nine were glad for being made whole, but only one returned to express his gratitude and, in so doing, was the recipient of nothing less than salvation. Interestingly, the word that in English reads “made well” is exactly the same word that is translated frequently “to be saved.” (4) This is the real deal, isn’t it? To move from outside the realm of God and close to the heart of God? Doesn’t this grateful double outcast show us the way to our own salvation? Is not gratitude the name of the way? I do not know a living soul who does not, on some level, still wish to be made whole. I do not know a more consistent theme in our faith tradition than that it is in glorifying God that we become most fully human.

“What is the chief end of man?” our Westminster Confession asks in our Presbyterian tradition. “To glorify God and enjoy God forever.” We cannot be fully human without understanding that our lives are gifts from God.

Think of your own life. Think of the leper, so full of gratitude that he couldn’t contain himself. Have you ever had a moment like that? When your own heart was overflowing? Those are the moments when you have said yes most clearly to life and to all that is good. Isn’t it an astonishing thing that God’s grace and mercy appear in every single kind of situation, even the most desperate? But God is mercifully present, granting what you need and what you could not possibly manufacture on your own.

A theologian named Louis Smedes, who several years ago came very close to death, was given a 20-1 set of odds that he would not make it. Smedes writes of that moment in his hospital bed in which he experienced the “unbearable goodness of being alive.” Listen to his magnificent words. At that moment, close to death,

I learned that gratitude is the best feeling I would ever have, the ultimate joy of living. It was . . . better than winning the lottery, better than watching your daughter graduate from college, better and deeper than any other feeling. It is perhaps the genesis of all good feelings in the human repertoire. I am sure that nothing in life can ever match the feeling of being held by a gracious energy percolating from the abyss where beats the loving heart of God. (5)

I have a longtime friend whose husband died suddenly and unexpectedly this September. Yesterday, a letter from my friend arrived from the Netherlands, written only six days ago. Here are her words: “I am slowly healing from Jan’s death. It is, of course, the small and unexpected surprises each day that catch me off guard. I work very hard to praise God in all things some days, but every day so far, I have succeeded.”

I think of those early times of thanksgiving on America’s shores and of the pilgrims on their knees in a strange land, praising God. There they were, doing battle against the wilderness, disease, and recurring crop failure and yet unable not to praise God for God’s pure and gracious gifts of guidance, presence, and the power to endure.

The great Reformed theologian Karl Barth once said that gratitude is the source of all virtue. Surely it follows that ingratitude is the source of all that is not virtuous—selfishness and self-centeredness, even despair and the destruction that often is its fruit.

We heard a reading earlier from the Book of Revelation. According to this interesting prophecy, thanksgiving is one of the seven activities that are a part of the eternal worship of God. “Blessing and glory and honor and thanksgiving and power and might to God forever and ever,” the angels around the throne sing. I do not know if you pay attention to the beautiful stained-glass windows in the sanctuary of Fourth Presbyterian Church, but sometime take a special look at the high right and left windows, and you will see angels blowing their trumpets. These are the “Angels in Adoration” windows, and beneath them is the reading from Revelation. Thanksgiving is a part of eternity!

No one is saying that to be authentically thankful comes naturally to us mortals. We begin life as a bundle of squalls and complaints, needs and wants. We have to grow spiritually to understand that gratitude is the main thing.

I think of a story I came across recently of a man who had been seated in a crowded restaurant. The waiter approached him and asked if he would mind having someone share the table with him, and the man said, “No, I don’t mind.”

The stranger sat down, and soon the food was served. The first man bowed his head and closed his eyes to say grace. When he opened his eyes, the other man said, “What’s the matter with you? Do you have a headache?”

“No,” he answered, “I was simply thanking God as I always do before I eat.”

“Oh, you are one of those, I see. Well, I want you to know I never give thanks. I get what I get because I deserve it and because I have earned it. I don’t have to give thanks to anybody, anytime, especially when I eat. I just start right in!”

The first man answered, “Well then, you are just like my dog. He does exactly the same thing.” (6)

People who achieve spiritual maturity, and surely that is your goal and mine, are people who develop their potential to be grateful. If you cannot muster up any gratitude this morning, then that is a sign to you that perhaps it is time for some spiritual readjustment. Today is the day to begin to get into the heavenly habit of giving thanks to God.

How do we do it? By the rituals of prayer and singing. Even when we do not necessarily feel grateful or joyful, the very acts of prayer and song have the power to change our perspective on life.

One more silly but apt story this morning. It is from the Hasidic Jewish tradition and is about a man who goes to his rabbi and complains that life is unbearable. “There are nine of us living in one room, what can I do?”

The rabbi answers, “Take your goat into the room with you.”

The man cannot believe that his spiritual leader has said such a thing, but the rabbi insists, “Do as I say and come back in a week.” A week later the man comes back looking more distraught than ever.

“We cannot stand it,” he tells the rabbi. “The goat is filthy, and our life is even more intolerable in that small room.”

The rabbi then tells him, “Go home and let the goat out. And come back in a week.” The man returns radiant a week later, exclaiming, “Life is beautiful, rabbi. We enjoy every minute now that there’s no goat—only nine of us after all.” (7)

Worship can change your outlook on life, but don’t stop with attitude adjustment. Express your gratitude by living a life of love and generosity. Every Thanksgiving, I make a list of that for which I am thankful. It occurred to me this year that I am most thankful that I am able to give of what I have as a minister, as a human being, to other people. What if you had to live for yourself alone? What could be a more miserable life than that?

I had this sermon all tucked away last night. This morning I went over it again after breakfast. When I came to church forty-five minutes ago, I decided to read my email. When I did, I decided to discard the final page of my sermon and share with you what I read.

The message was sent at 8:10 p.m. Wednesday evening. Evan Farrar directs the Elam Davies Social Service Center here, a place of hospitality and compassion at the corner of Michigan and Chestnut. He writes, “Tonight as I was finishing up before heading home, I went upstairs to check our mailbox. In my box was an envelope addressed to me from one of our longtime guests here at Fourth Presbyterian Church. I opened the envelope, and inside I found a single twenty dollar bill wrapped inside two pieces of paper. A few weeks ago, this guest had run out of money and was worried about what might happen if he discontinued his medication. So we agreed that I would give him the gift. On the eve of Thanksgiving he wanted to give a gift back to the Elam Davies Social Center so that others could be helped.”

Evan wrote this note to his friend, “Thank you for your gift to us. We will put it back into our fund so that we are able to help someone else. . . . I am so grateful for your good spirit here at Fourth Presbyterian Church, how every time you come among us, we are better because you are here. . . . I am grateful for the many ways you give back to us.”

Evan closes his message to me with these words, “This was a gift not of abundance, but rather true gratitude.”

To give thanks to God, to give to others—these are the things that keep us human. These are the main things. Let the grateful guest lead you into the presence of the most gracious God, source of every good and lasting gift. May blessing and glory, wisdom and thanksgiving, honor and power and might be unto our God this Thanksgiving Day and forever and ever. Amen.

Notes
1. David Mosser, “A November Full of Thanksgiving,” Preaching Great Texts, Vol. II, No. 1, 2002, p. 19.

2. Fred B. Craddock, Luke, John Knox Press, 1990, p. 203.

3. Ibid.

4. Ibid.

5. St. Paul Journey, St. Paul Lutheran Church newsletter, Davenport, Iowa, 25 February 2000.

6 Mosser, p. 21-22.

7. Ibid.