NOT A DAY GOES BY: THE
CURSE OF MEMORY
A Sermon for Plymouth
Congregation Church, Wichita, Kansas
Sunday, May 29, 2016
By Pastor Paul Ellis
Jackson
Traditional Word
Mark 14:66-72
While Peter was below
in the courtyard, one of the servant-girls of the high priest came by. When she
saw Peter warming himself, she stared at him and said, “You also were with
Jesus, the man from Nazareth.” But he denied it, saying, “I do not know or understand
what you are talking about.” And he went out into the forecourt. Then the cock
crowed. And the servant-girl, on seeing him, began again to say to the
bystanders, “This man is one of them.”
But again he denied it. Then after a little while the bystanders again
said to Peter, “Certainly you are one of them; for you are a Galilean.” But he
began to curse, and he swore an oath, “I do not know this man you are talking
about.” At that moment the cock crowed
for the second time. Then Peter remembered that Jesus had said to him, “Before
the cock crows twice, you will deny me three times.” And he broke down and
wept.
Contemporary Word
“Not a day goes by, not
a single day; but you're somewhere a part of my life…where’s the day I’ll have
started forgetting?” Stephen Sondheim
Humans are cursed with memory aren’t
we? I’ve heard it said that it’s a blessing to have a bad memory: You don’t
remember all of those slights against you and then you don’t have any grudges
against those who slighted you. But, of course, the downside to this is you
don’t get to remember the good stuff either. I suppose a perfect memory would
be one that filters out the bad stuff and only leaves the good. I’ve been
accused of having this kind of memory. But I can also be frozen in place sometimes
when some odd memory surfaces in my brain and I stand there thinking: “Did I
really do that?” or “How on earth did that happen?” or “What I wouldn’t give to
be able to go back and handle that in a different way”.
What it must have been like for Peter,
then. Imagine how much his heart must’ve ached after he realized what he had
done. Here he was, denying the man he’d spent the last few years following,
working with, trusting, and sharing meals with. Peter and his brother Andrew
had been recruited by Jesus just a few years earlier with Jesus saying to them:
“come and be fishers of men”. And then in Matthew 16 we get the story of Jesus
asking his followers ‘who do you say that I am” and Peter answers: “You are the
messiah. Son of the living God”. So, the man who reassures Jesus and tells him
that He is the Messiah—the Son of the Living God—doesn’t sound like someone who
is undecided about Jesus’ credentials, right? And for this man to then go on
and betray Jesus at a critical point in Jesus’ last week…well, that leaves me
scratching my head and wondering what one earth Peter must have felt after this
betrayal. The regret that he surely felt at his part in the arrest of Jesus.
The scripture tells us he “broke down and wept.” He realized what he had done. He
had regret.
But when we remember Peter, is the
first thing that comes to mind his betrayal of Jesus? No! We recall that he was
a fisherman--that he was one of the twelve apostle--and that Jesus built his
church upon him. Peter means rock so Jesus made him the rock, the foundation of
his church—the very man who betrayed him. Jesus forgave Peter and put him in
charge of continuing his memory-- his legacy. A legacy that lasts, obviously,
to today. I mean, here we are—remembering Jesus.
I’m so grateful that I went through all of my
youthful follies before the advent of Social Media. It’s bad enough when
Facebook pops up some memory from three years ago that I’d rather forget.
Imagine having your entire life stored on hard drives and servers and thrown
back in your face just when you sooner forget. I’m worried for some of our
young people who might end up with some serious regrets. Behaviors, antics and
peccadilloes that are better off with only a handful of people knowing about
them are now broadcast to thousands AND stored in vast server farms that will
never forget. This makes a nice corollary to the story of Peter’s betrayal.
Think about it—his betrayal of Jesus was so important that it’s in the three
synoptic gospels pretty much the same way. Peter realizes what he has done, has
regret and cries.
The Gospel of John tweaks the story a bit and does
not have Peter crying and showing regret. Perhaps that early community of
followers of that Christ Movement, the Johannine Community, needed a Peter who
didn’t cry—a Peter who had no regrets? It’s almost impossible for us to know
why the writer of the Gospel of John chose to leave our the regret part, but it
interesting to think about. They wanted to remember a Peter who had no regrets.
Why?
Tomorrow we celebrate Memorial Day. I used to be
pretty ambivalent about this holiday. It usually just meant a three-day weekend
and often this was spent in Dallas with a group of friends from college in one
of our annual reunions. But in the past few years, this holiday has become more
and more important to me. For the past couple of years, Duane and I have
visited the local cemeteries where are family members who have died are buried.
This means a trip to Derby, where we both grew up and where a number of our
family members now rest. It’s not necessarily a sad time. It’s bittersweet. We
spend time searching for graves and making sure we spend a moment lingering
over each marker. There’s a lovely, quiet solemnity in a graveyard on Memorial
day. Most who are there are busy with their tasks of flower arranging and grave
maintenance. Brushing dirt off of a neglected marker, or pulling weeds from
around a patch of earth. It’s a humbling time—standing in a cemetery—looking at
the great mass of humanity that has left the earth and gone on to their glory.
It’s humbling because I think in the back of all of our minds is the thought…I,
too, am going to die someday. Just like everybody else on this planet. Someday,
I will no longer be physically present. Now we all have ideas of what awaits us
after our deaths and the scriptures provide some insights as well. For me, I
think that since I came from God that upon my death I will return to God. In
what form that takes, I don’t know. Nor does it really matter. What really matters
is what I do with the time remaining. In whatever time we have—working to build
the Beloved Community of Right Relationships should be our primary task. And
standing in a cemetery contemplating my demise is a surefire way to even more
finely focus my attitude on building that Beloved Community.
Stephen Sondheim wrote a beautiful song about
remembering: “Not a Day Goes By” and thank you so much Ted for that beautiful
rendition. If you listened carefully to the lyrics you heard someone who has
experienced some great loss and is unable to forget this person. We don’t know
who the person was: a lover, a friend—it could be anyone. And I think we’ve all
been in that position—I hope we’ve all been in that position. Someone who
entered our lives and became a part of the fabric of those lives—so much so
that when they are gone there is a tremendous hole where they used to be. And
sometimes we are stuck. We can’t move one from that memory. There’s such great
pain in the unfinished story of that person and you that you are lost. You are
unable to move on. But maybe that’s part
of your story. It’s up to you to fill in the gaps—to address the empty
spaces—and to find a way to propel the story forward without that beloved
person. Your story must go on without them. Perhaps the story is just paused
and awaits your input as to what happens next.
Part of my work as Associate Minister at University
Congregational Church is to assist our Senior Minister, Robin McGonigle, with
pastoral care issues. When I took this position in the summer of 2013, I
started working with a number of our older congregants on a variety of issues.
Duane and I would put up grab bars or hand rails or make other simple
adjustments or suggestions to help with mobility issues in a member’s home. Or
I’d take them shopping or make sure that someone in the congregation did so.
One particular member of our congregation was Becky Tucker. Now I had known
Becky since I joined University Congregational’s choir in 1995. She had sung in
the choir since almost the beginning—over 30 years. Last year Becky had a
serious fall and broke her leg. She ended up in a rehab facility and here was
an opportunity for me to be an even better pastoral care giver as Becky had no
local family. So whenever Becky needed help, she’d call on me and I’d be right
there. Or if I was out of town or unavailable, I’d make sure someone from the
church did so. A couple of Wednesdays ago, I picked up Becky for our one of our
usual shopping trips and we had our usual silly fun time at Dillons. I mostly
followed her around while she rode her scooter through the store gathering her
supplies for the week. She was a maniac on that scooter and I often warned the
people in the vicinity that their lives were in jeopardy. Becky liked being
thought of as a dangerous shopper. That Wednesday evening we had choir
rehearsal and Becky was there, as always, ready to sing and have fun with a
choir she’d been with over 30 years. Because that Wednesday night was our last
Wednesday night choir rehearsal for the season, the choir went out to the
Bricktown Restaurant on rock Road for a celebration. Becky went along, sat next
to me and I bought her dinner because I knew this was an extravagance for her.
As Duane and I were preparing to leave, she leaned over and said she’d like a
slice of cheesecake and without a moment’s hesitation I handed her a ten dollar
bill and told her to enjoy that cheesecake. And I am so glad I did. The next
day, Becky’s sister called me to tell me that Becky had had a massive heart
attack and had just died. I knew she had no family in town so I instantly
rushed to Wesley and was able to say goodbye to her for all of the people in
her life who just could not be at her side.
I will be officiating Becky’s funeral here in a few
weeks—her family is scattered about the country, so it took some time to find a
day when everyone could come to Wichita. Becky’s death reminded me once again
of the fragility of our lives and of the sacredness of the everyday. The beauty
of the mundane. Her last hours on earth she spent doing those things that gave
her great pleasure—singing and celebrating and eating some delicious
cheesecake. And I learned an important lesson: Never forgo the opportunity to
buy someone a slice of cheesecake. You never know if it might be their last.
And if you do so, you won’t regret that you didn’t. University Congregational
Church’s second Senior Minister, the Rev. Dr. Gary Cox, whom we lost way too
early in 2006, said something in one of his sermons that has stuck with me to this very day. He
said, whenever I am faced with an important decision. Or when I am sitting on
the horns of a dilemma. Anytime I am faced with a situation that I know requires
thoughtful reflection on my part. I sit back and I imagine how I want to
remember this moment at my time of death. Do I want to look back on it with
regret and anxiety because I made a selfish and shortsighted, quick decision?
Do I want to look back on it with ambivalence because I put off making the
decision and left it for someone else to work out? Or do I want to look back on the memory with
fondness and love, because the decision I made considered others—it took into
account the fact that we are not alone in this world and that our decisions,
however small, might impact many other people for many years to come. Did my
choice help further the building of God’s Beloved Community of Right
Relationship? Did I offer love and selflessness? Will I be proud of my choices
on my deathbed? Obviously this has stuck with me and I hope you hear Gary’s
words this morning and that they might resonate with you in some manner as
well. How do you want to recall your life on your deathbed? Do you want to
remember a life of regret, fear and worry? A selfish life where you put your
needs first? Or do you want to look back on a life of selflessness, of service
to others, of love freely given and wrongs quickly forgiven and pride in your
accomplishments? The choice is yours and you can start living a selfless life
right now. I think part of our commitment to the Jesus Movement includes
selflessness. Walking the way of Jesus, faithfully, can help us live a life
without regret. I mean, if Jesus can make his betrayer the rock of his legacy,
what do you think he can do with you?
Tomorrow,
regardless of if you visit a cemetery or not, take a few moments to remember
those you have lost. Smile in warm remembrance of their lives and what they
meant to you. Think about the gift that their life was—find the gift in their
life—the blessing—the reason that you were so glad to have known them and why
you are grateful that, for whatever time you had, they were part of your life
and not a day goes by that you are so glad that you knew them. No regrets. Just
love. The price of love is loss—and still we pay—we love anyway. Amen.
Thank you for inviting me here this
morning.
