A Fourth Church Sermon by Adam H. Fronczek

October 12, 2008 | 6:30 p.m. Vespers

Happy Talk

Adam H. Fronczek
Associate Pastor, Fourth Presbyterian Church

Psalm 100:1–5
Philippians 4:1–9

Last week, I read an interesting editorial in the Wall Street Journal called “Happy Talk.” Like most editorials in recent days, the topic was the economy, and the position taken was yet another possible explanation for how and why things have gone south in recent days. The position of this author was that “happy talk,” or an excessive kind of positive thinking, is what has landed us in a financial mess. He cited a number of examples of how this takes place; many of them were drawn from business practices and are no doubt familiar to some of us.

One illustration acknowledged that employee happiness has become the driving force behind most human resources departments. We read about successful companies who have gone to great lengths to make the office environment more “fun,” the argument being that if employees are happy, they are more likely to be productive. Any amount of time, energy, and capital spent keeping employees happy will ultimately result in profits.

Positive thinking also affects the way companies set their goals and establish strategies. Corporate strategy and management consulting in recent years has become full of methods that focus on strengths rather than weaknesses, implying that businesses that focus their energy on what they do best will maintain a positive kind of energy around their work, and this too will result in profits.

Positive thinking even extends beyond business and into the realm of culture. Speaking of profitable enterprises, my editoral writer also cited the book, The Secret, a short book that has sold more than 8 million copies because of people’s interest in its basic idea, that the beneficent universe in which we live will reward our heartfelt beliefs. In other words, if you focus your energy on good things happening to you, good things will happen.

Not to absolve my own profession from the argument, I must add a bit about the church. Both in the United States and abroad, the fastest-growing churches are most often the ones where a prosperity gospel is preached, a message that says that God wants us to be successful, to be rich, to be happy. In the last few years, at least, that seems to be what many people want to hear when they come to worship. (There are actually so many parallels between the business culture and the church culture of happiness, that in preparing this sermon I tried to come up with some kind of good play on the words profits and prophets, but I couldn’t quite get there.)

Unfortunately, another thing that connects the prevailing business and church attitudes about happiness is the fact that there are some significant holes in this kind of happy thinking, and that was the point of the Wall Street Journal article. Many would say that the recent decline in our economy has been the result of overconfident business leaders, consumers, and investors who ignored the weaknesses and vulnerabilities that remained in the system, even in these recent, prosperous years. Likewise, on the human resources front, a recent study from the University of Illinois indicates that happy workers actually may be so distracted and unfocused that, even if they like their jobs, they don’t work any faster and, in some cases, work even slower than their less-happy counterparts. And the problem with a philosophy about a beneficent universe that always returns good for good or talk about a God who only wants us to be happy is that eventually, when we get a raw deal, when life sends us something that makes us unhappy, when things don’t go our way, then under the assumptions of happy talk, it’s easy for one to lose faith altogether.

The same week I was reading that article in the Wall Street Journal and wondering what we’re supposed to think about, I read this passage from Paul’s letter to the Philippians: “Finally, beloved, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is pleasing, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence and if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things” (4:8). I was a little taken aback, because this passage sure sounds like an argument for positive thinking or even happy talk. But then it occurred to me that there’s a context.

This verse comes at the end of the Letter to the Philippians, a letter in which Paul has written to a group of Christians and has focused a tremendous amount of his time and energy in the letter on the problems their community has been having. There’s no chance of ignoring the shortcomings of the Philippian church. Paul knows it; his readers know it; everyone knows it. And so having addressed all of their problems in detail, only then does he finish by saying, “Yes, but I have hope for you, so do not despair.”

You see, it’s not that God doesn’t want us to be happy; it’s not that God doesn’t want us to think about good things; but God does want us to acknowledge that we live in a world where people need to pay attention to the problems of our world and go out and do something about them.

It’s easy to forget that there are problems out there when things are going well. The Bible is actually full of stories of people who go down this road. You might remember the story of Moses before the burning bush. God commands Moses to go to Egypt and Moses doesn’t want to go. Why? Well, as the story goes, he was born in Egypt, and though Moses was an Israelite, he grew up in an Egyptian household, raised by the pharaoh’s daughter. One day, in his young adulthood, Moses is out walking when he sees an Egyptian beating a Hebrew slave, one of Moses’ own people, and in anger Moses rises up and kills that Egyptian. As a result, he flees for his life, leaves Egypt to save himself, and as luck would have it, Moses soon finds himself living far away in Midean with a new wife and a new family. He’s very happy; Moses has forgotten his Hebrew brothers and sisters whom he has left enslaved in Egypt. But God has not forgotten them, and God tells Moses it’s time to go back to Egypt and confront some of those unpleasant memories. The thing that is so true to life about the story is that Moses doesn’t want to go, because he’s happy enough ignoring the troubles of the world.

When things are going well, it’s easy to forget that there are problems out there. It’s annual appeal season here at Fourth Church, the time when we ask our members to think about what they can give to the church to help with the mission and ministry. Some people give time and some their talents and others money, and we simply want people to give what they are able to give, whatever that might mean for each one of you. So at this time of year, and in our current situation, I want to remind you that one of the great blessings of our congregation here at Fourth Church is that in the good times, when happy talk has been the norm, we have never forgotten that it’s a tough world out there. When the economy was good and stocks were up, we didn’t just pay attention to ourselves. We looked out into our world. In recent years, this congregation has expanded our programs in almost every area. This church is a light in the city. We provide tutors for children and meals for the hungry. We gather on holidays with our Catholic and Jewish and Muslim brothers and sisters to celebrate the peace that can exist between people of different faith traditions. This congregation cares for the sick and the bereaved and helps unemployed and underemployed people to find jobs. We provide a sense of family to single people of all ages and we counsel married couples and parents and children through the challenges of family life. In every recent year of these times of happy talk, hundreds more people have become a part of the Fourth Church family.

This year, the happy talk of our culture is being called into question. We have never forgotten that we live in the midst of a world in need. We must not forget it this year. The needs of our city and our world will be great this year, perhaps greater than they have been in a long, long time.

When God came to that happy man named Moses long ago, God said this:

“I have observed the misery of my people who are in Egypt; I have heard their cry on account of their taskmasters. Indeed, I know their sufferings, and I have come down to deliver them from the Egyptians, and to bring them up out of that land to a good and broad land, a land flowing with milk and honey. . . . I will send you, [Moses], to Pharaoh to bring my people, the Israelites, out of Egypt.” But Moses said to God, “Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh, and bring the Israelites out of Egypt?” He said, “I will be with you.” (Exodus 3)

It’s not that God doesn’t want us to be happy. But the essence of what it is to be faithful is knowing that when times are not easy, God is with us still. So when, during the tough times, God pulls us aside, as God did with Moses, and says to those of us who are happy, “I will send you,” I know that we will continue to go where God sends us.

In this community, where we strive never to ignore the needs of our world in the good and pleasant times, help us to be a source of the good even when others are in a time of despair. As Paul said to the Philippians at a time when there was little happy talk to be heard: “Whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is pleasing, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence and if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things.”

Amen.