Flipping the Tires of Life

 

Rev. Molly F. James, PhD
DFMS Noonday Prayer
Commemoration of Anna Alexander
September 24, 2020

May God’s Word be spoken. May God’s Word be heard. May that point us to the living Word who is Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

‘Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me; for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.’

Oh, what a good Scripture for today. I think this might be a good Scripture for our pandemic season. I think we are all weary and carrying heavy burdens. We are carrying heavy burdens for lots of reasons. We are living in the midst of the realities of COVID and systemic racism. We are in the midst of political division, of uncertainty about how the election will go. And then there are the personal burdens we are carrying because of the challenges we are dealing with in our home lives or in our extended family. We are all carrying them and there are days where the burdens can feel unbearably heavy.

And so we need this Scripture today. And we need the story of the life of Anna Alexander. If you don’t know about Anna, I commend her story to you. She was the first African-American woman ordained to the diaconate in The Episcopal Church. She was ordained in 1907 in the Diocese of Georgia. Despite numerous challenges, she did tremendous work to serve the poor and needy and to promote education in the communities she served. No doubt she carried many burdens. Particularly because the successor to her ordaining bishop did not provide financial support to her community and excluded African-Americans from Church governance. But she persevered. She just kept going and building community.

I bet Anna had her days of frustration. Her days of wishing things were different. She lived through droughts and the Great Depression. She knew what it was to have dreams and plans thwarted by forces beyond her control. She was faced with the choice we all are in the face of seemingly insurmountable difficulties. We can choose to give up. We can throw in the towel and say never mind. But here is the thing. If we are tempted to do that, if we feel like there is no way forward, then I think we have lost our focus, lost our center.

As many of you know, I have been re-reading the Book of Joy (a record of a week of conversation between Desmond Tutu and the Dalai Lama). In that book, they note that “Despair turns us inward. Hope sends us into the arms of others.” That’s the crux of it. If we feel ourselves going down the road of despair, it is because we have turned too far inward. Hope is a communal activity. We find it together. Anna found it because she did not work alone. Her ministry was not solitary. She was in community, working with and empowering others. That is why she could choose perseverance over defeat.

And that is the truth at the heart of our Gospel today. We do not journey alone. We are invited to share our burdens. With Christ, and with those who manifest God’s presence in our lives. All of a sudden things which seemed impossible no longer are, because we are not trying to do them all by ourselves. Let me offer a tangible example from my experience at CrossFit. In pre-pandemic times when we could do collaborative workouts, we would flip tires. These are not your average tires. They are enormous tractor tires or tires from heavy equipment. They weigh hundreds of pounds. Alone there would be no chance of budging it an inch. But put three of us together on the tire and suddenly we can flip the tire over and over again down the alley.

So, if you are currently staring at an enormous “tire” in your life or in some other way feeling overburdened right now, may I suggest taking inspiration from our Scriptures and from Deacon Anna. Do not despair. Do not give up. Instead, reach out. Connect more deeply with Christ. Ask for help from your companions on the way. Together we can do so much more. Hope and joy are found in the blessings of collaboration and teamwork.

These are challenging times. No doubt about it. And we can take comfort and strength from remembering that we do not journey alone. God is with us. In Spirit and in the very tangible form of colleagues, friends, and family members whose presence and wisdom bring light and love to life for us each and every day. Amen.

Lessons from the Farmyard

Rev. Molly F. James, PhD

DFMS Noonday Prayer via Zoom

July 16, 2020

Isaiah 26:7-9, 12, 16-19; Psalm 102:12-22; Matthew 11:28-30

May God’s Word be spoken. May God’s Word be heard. May that point us to the living Word who is Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. 

I loved reading the Little House on the Prairie books when I was a child. And I also loved the book Laura Wilder wrote about her husband’s childhood on a farm in upstate New York. I loved that book especially because so much of that farm reminded me of my grandparents’ farm where I spent lots of time as a child. The house, the barn, the fields that I pictured in my mind were those of my grandparents’. In Farmer Boy, there is a long story about Almanzo learning to drive a pair of calves. His father whittles him a miniature yoke (a much smaller version of what is used to drive full size oxen). Almanzo puts this wooden yoke on the calves and teaches them how to step in unison, to turn left and to turn right. This may sound simple, but it is a long and complicated process. It is no small thing to get two young, excited calves to listen, to learn commands and to respond to them in perfect unison. Because, of course, when they are yoked together if they don’t act in unison there will be quite a mess. 

Almanzo learns two very important lessons in the course of this process. He learns about gentleness, and he learns about patience. At the beginning of the process his father gives him a small bullwhip with the explicit instructions that it is never to be used to whip the animals, merely to make a sound next to them that will help them learn the commands. He will get much farther and get far better work out of the calves if he is gentle with them. The challenge is that being gentle also takes patience. The rewards are great, but it takes more time and effort on the front end. 

It would seem to me that Almanzo’s experience offers us some insight into our Gospel reading for today. Jesus asks us to take his yoke upon us, to learn from him, for he is gentle and humble. Ah, there it is - gentleness again. That is indeed the kind of teacher Jesus is. He is gentle and humble. He seeks to guide us - not to terrify us or force us, but to gently invite us into a way forward that will in fact be rewarding and fruitful. 

So the parallels with Jesus as gentle teacher and guide are easy, what about the calves? That’s us, after all. How are we doing on that part? I think there are two important lessons for us in that. First is in the fact there is a yoke involved. Here is the important thing. A yoke is not a solitary thing. It is for the express purpose of bringing two animals together to be a team. So, first and foremost, Jesus is telling us (as he has modeled in his own ministry, in how he sent out the disciples) that this life of faith is not a solitary activity. We do not get to go it alone. And if we try, we are going to cause a complete mess. If you don’t have experience with yoked farm animals, perhaps you once did a three legged race in gym class or for a field day? If you went off one way without coordinating with the friend whose leg was tied to yours, how did that go? Not well. Generally that ended with everyone on the ground, possibly in pain. So, the best results come through coordinated teamwork that is following the direction of the teacher. 

The second important lesson is about listening. How well do you suppose it would have gone for those calves if they had spent all their time eating grass or trying to play or just generally ignoring Almanzo? They never would have left the barnyard to do the meaningful work of hauling loads of hay or wood. They would not have seen the woods or the blooming meadows. They would not have gotten to drink cool water from the creek. In short, they would have missed out on important work and seeing the wider world. I think the same might be true for us. If we fail to quiet ourselves, fail to pay attention to God and to all the various teammates with whom we have the opportunity to work over the course of our ministry, then we will miss out. If we get too focused, as one of our confessions says, “on the devices and desires of our own hearts,” then we will miss out on opportunities to do good and holy work and we will miss out on seeing the beauty that surrounds us. 

In the days ahead, I hope that we will be attentive to the ways that Jesus is guiding us, open to the opportunities for partnership (because we can always do better work in a team!), and willing to listen and learn, so that we might be able to experience life and the splendor of creation more fully. AMEN.