Four Ways of Knowing God: Sermon for the Last Sunday after the Epiphany, Year B (Feb. 26, 2006)

In the twelfth chapter of the Gospel according to St. Mark, a scribe asks Jesus, "What is the greatest commandment?" Jesus's answer, which we know as "The Summary of the Law" is this:

Jesus answered, "The first is, 'Hear, O Israel: the Lord our God, the Lord is one; you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength.' The second is this, 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.' There is no other commandment greater than these." (Mark 12:29-31)

Jesus here outlines four ways of knowing and loving God: with your heart, with your soul, with your mind, and with your strength.

In the eighth and ninth chapter of Mark’s Gospel, from which we read the story of the Transfiguration this morning, the Evangelist gives us examples of each of these ways of knowing. Indeed, Mark leads us through a logical progression such as an inquirer into the Christian faith might experience as he or she explores and then experiences a relationship with God in the Person of Jesus Christ.

In today's Gospel reading, Mark first makes reference to something which happened earlier, six days earlier to be precise. This antecedent event was a conversation initiated by Jesus who asked his closest disciples, "Who do people say I am?" (Mark 8:27) After some repartee about public speculation, Jesus put the Twelve on the spot and asked, "But who do you say I am?" In answer to this, Simon Peter blurted out, "You are the Messiah." (Mark 8:29) And this illustrates the first way of knowing ... with one's mind.

This first way of knowing is the one most familiar to us who live in the scientific age: intellectual assent, the acceptance of a proposition as true. "Jesus is the Messiah." One may know a lot of things in this way. I know, for example, that the earth orbits the sun, that viruses cause disease, that Beijing is the capital of the People's Republic of China, and that George Washington was the first President of the United States. I know none of these things because of direct, personal observation, nor do I know them as a result of some mystical or miraculous occurrence. I know them because I have accepted the propositions as true; that is, I have intellectually assented to the validity of these statements.

From time to time I find evangelistic pamphlets and fliers tucked under my car's windshield wipers or left on the counters of public rest rooms in which I am instructed on how to become a "saved" person. All I need do, say these pamphlets is say, "Jesus Christ is my Lord and Savior." I suggest to you that the pamphlets are wrong. That sort of intellectual assent falls quite a bit short of the saving faith to which Christians are truly called. It is, in reality, merely a modern version of the ancient heresy called "Gnosticism."

Gnosticism was a religion of salvation through knowledge; the word "gnosticism" derives from the Greek word for knowledge, gnosiV (gnosis). The gnostic claimed to know God, but was only concerned with intellectual knowledge, with mental assent to certain truths; moral behavior was not critical. The evangelicals who distribute those pamphlets today are interpreting salvation in these terms, defining the essentials of saving faith as mere intellectual assent. St. Paul refers to such salvation by knowledge as "falsely called knowledge" (1 Tim 6:20) in contrast to "the knowledge of the truth that leads to godliness" (Tit 1:1).

Gnosticism and other heterodox teachings were defined as heresies not because they were necessarily wrong, but because they were incomplete. Assent to the proposition, "Jesus is the Messiah" or "Jesus is my Lord and Savior" is not wrong, but it falls short of loving God not only with one's mind, but with one's heart, one's soul, and one's strength. It is merely a first step along the pilgrimage of the Christian life.

As St. Mark leads us along that path, we come to Chapter Nine of his Gospel where we come to the second way of knowing and loving God, the way illustrated by the event he describes first in today's Gospel reading, through mystical revelation, the "AHA!" experience. Not every "AHA!" experience is as dramatic as the vision of Jesus with Moses and Elijah seen by Simon Peter, James and John. Nor does every "AHA!" experience reveal a profound truth.

The story of an "AHA!" experience is told about Oliver Wendell Holmes, Senior, who was a surgeon. He was very interested in the use of ether, but felt he should know how his patients would feel under its influence, so he had a dose administered to himself. As he was going under, in a dreamy state, a profound thought came to him. He believed that he had suddenly grasped the key to all the mysteries of the universe. When he regained consciousness, however, he was unable to remember what the insight was. Because of the great importance this thought would be to mankind, Holmes arranged to have himself given either again. This time he had a stenographer present to take down the great thought. The ether was administered, and sure enough, just before passing out the insight reappeared. He mumbled the words, the stenographer took them down, and he went to sleep confident in the knowledge that he had succeeded. Upon awakening, he turned eagerly to the stenographer and asked her to read what he had uttered. This is what she read: "The entire universe is permeated with a strong odor of turpentine."

This is why mystical insights should not be accepted uncritically. However, they can offer hypotheses worth serious consideration. As a general rule, mystical insights do not contradict the facts known from sensory perception. Rather, they enable us to see new connections, to make new interpretations of ordinary experiences, and to add new dimensions of emotionality, value, and morality to our lives. Peter had intellectually assented that Jesus was "the Messiah, the Son of the Living God;" the mystical experience on the mountain top added a spiritual three- dimensionality to that proposition.

Each of us can and most of us do experience "AHA!" moments in our lives. They may not be as dramatic as the Transfiguration, but we all have had those moments of insight when the Universe just comes together and makes sense, when we know that God is "there for us." Mystical revelation is authoritative for the person who experiences it. The mystic's values, behavior, and life course are completely changed by a mystical revelation. He takes the step of loving God with all his soul.

But it is just that, a step ... the "AHA!" experience, the mystical event on the mountain top, passes ... the change in our values, in our behavior, in our life, may be permanent, but the event is not. That is why Jesus does not let Peter concretize the Transfiguration by the building of "dwellings," that is why Jesus leads Peter, James and John down off the mountain.

If we were to read further in Mark’s story, instead of stopping our reading at the descent from the mountain, we come to the story of Jesus's healing of an epileptic boy, in which the third and fourth ways of knowing and loving God are illustrated.

As related by Mark, Jesus, Peter, James and John join the rest of the Twelve together with a larger crowd. A man whose son is possessed by a convulsive spirit, that is, an epileptic, begs Jesus to cure him, which he does. St. Luke, who also tells this story, tells us that all who witness the healing "were astounded at the greatness of God." (Luke 9:43) This is the third way of coming to know God, through indirect revelation. Where a mystical experience is a direct revelation to the soul, a miracle indirectly reveals God to us through God's actions. Coming to know God in this manner is what Jesus spoke of as "loving God with all your heart." (Mk 12:30)

According the theologian Karl Rahner, the term "heart" was used in the primitive anthropology of Jesus's time to refer to the "dynamic principle which drives man to seek ultimate understanding." (K. Rahner, Dictionary of Theology, Crossroad 1990, pg. 203.) It is the heart which perceives the miraculous. A miracle, says Rahner, "is no lawless, arbitrary display of God's omnipotence." Rather, it is "part of a universal context of saving history" confirming that we are "called to the companionship of God." (Ibid., pg. 310.)

It is important for us to note that the word "miracle" is never used in the Bible. In the New Testament, what we call the "miracles of Christ," are most commonly referred to by the Greek was terata (terata). This word literally means "wonders," referring to feelings of amazement excited by their occurrence. We have all known the experience of something "touching our hearts." Our presiding bishop, Frank Griswold, has written of the heart being "permeable to God's presence and God's mystery." (F. Griswold, Listening with the Ear of the Heart, Cross Currents, Winter 1998-99, Vol. 49, No.1.) Bishop Griswold reminds us that "The prologue of the Rule of St. Benedict begins: 'Listen carefully . . . . and incline the ear of your heart.'" (Ibid.) If we do that, if we listen with the ear of our heart, if we allow our hearts to be touched, we will behold the miraculous, the wonder-full in everything around us. In the words of St. Isaac of Nineveh, our hearts will "burn with love for the whole of creation, for humankind, for the birds, for the beasts, for the demons: for every creature." In that way, we will "love God with our whole heart."

Finally, Mark illustrates what it is to come to know and love God with "our whole strength." The Greek word used in St. Mark's Gospel is iscuV (iskhus), which means not only "strength," but also "power" and "ability." To love with all of one's iscuV is to love with everything one has; one might say that it is to love with one's whole being. This fourth and most direct way to know and love God is shown in the experience of the epileptic boy; to know and love God with all of one's being is to be set free, to be personally liberated by God from the demons which enslave us as the boy was set free from the convulsive spirit which possessed him.

This then is the path along which Mark brings us, from the first step of accepting with our minds the proposition that Jesus is the Son of God, through a mystical encounter with the Christ, to witnessing the effects of his love in the lives of others and, finally, to our own being set free from what Paul called "the bondage of sin." This is four-fold experience of knowledge and love is what Paul describes in Today’s Epistle as light shining in the darkness, shining “in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.”

"Where the Spirit of the Lord is," Paul wrote in his Second Epistle to the Corinthians, "there is freedom." (2 Cor. 3:17)

But being freed from sin is not the end of the journey. Indeed, it is only the beginning! If we were to read further in Mark's Chapter Nine, we would come verses 30 and 31 in which Mark writes:

They went on from there and passed through Galilee. He did not want anyone to know it; for he was teaching his disciples, saying to them, "The Son of Man is to be betrayed into human hands, and they will kill him, and three days after being killed, he will rise again."

In other words, Jesus set out with firm determination to follow the route that would eventually lead to Calvary and his crucifixion.

If we truly love God with all our mind, assenting that Jesus is our Savior and our Lord ... if we truly love God with all our soul, encountering him in Spirit and mystery on the mountain tops of our lives ... if we truly love God with all our heart, witnessing with wonder God at work in the world around us ... if we truly love God with all our strength, set free to follow him with our whole being ... we will go that way with him. We will follow the road to Calvary, bringing the love and power of God into the lives of others and, if called upon to do so, willingly giving up our lives for the good of others.

The journey starts today.... It starts every day.... Every minute.... Amen.

An Affirmative Commitment -- Sermon for the Seventh Sunday after the Epiphany, Year B

In today's Epistle lesson, taken from Paul's second letter to the Church at Corinth, we read:

As surely as God is faithful, our word to you has not been "Yes and No." For the Son of God, Jesus Christ, whom we proclaimed among you, Silvanus and Timothy and I, was not "Yes and No"; but in him it is always "Yes." For in him [that is, in Jesus] every one of God's promises is a "Yes."

In today's Gospel lesson, in which St. Mark recounts the familiar tale of the time when friends of a paralyzed man were so frantic to get their friend to Jesus, whom they have heard could cure him, they dig a hole through the roof of the house in which Jesus is meeting with people and lower the paralytic down through the hole on a sort of stretcher. Jesus is impressed by this show of faith and says to the man, "Son, your sins are forgiven." This upsets the scribes and Pharisees who believe only God can forgive sins and, thus, that Jesus has blasphemed by pretending to speak for God.

For Jesus’s critics, religion was a negative and restrictive thing, a set of rules most of which began with the words, "Thou shalt not...." Jesus answers them by saying, in effect, is it easier to be negative or to be positive, to be condemning or to be affirming. He sets for us an example of religion which is positive and hopeful, as opposed to one that is negative and mired in restrictions and prohibitions.

R. Alan Culpepper, Dean of the School of Theology at Atlanta's Mercer University, has noted that

...[t]here are two ways of approaching obedience to God. Some define their religious beliefs and practices with alist of things they may not do: "Thou shalt not ...." Such lists set boundaries, but they do not define goals. A commitment to God that is born of the experience of God's love and presence is expressed in grateful participation in God's redemptive work. (The New Interpreter's Bible, Vol. IX, Abingdon 1995, Commentary on Luke, page 78.)

This is what Jesus is doing in today’s Gospel lesson: setting an xample of participation in God’s redemptive work. Jesus sets the example, and Paul, by underscoring that in Jesus God’s promise to us is a "Yes," calls the church, to a religion of positive, affirmative, hopeful commitment to the future.

We have just passed through that time of year when people make such commitments to the future called "New Year's resolutions;" so as we continue to keep those resolutions, it is a good time to remember that that our faith does not circumscribe our conduct. Rather our Christian faith calls us to see far horizons and to strive to reach them. Roger F. Campbell, in his book You Can Win!, SP Publications 1985, pp. 10-11, sites two other commentators and writes this about planning for the future:

Most of us do not accomplish much because we do not expect to accomplish very much. A. B. Simpson indicated the majority of us when he said, "Our God has boundless resources. The only limit is in us. Our asking, our thinking, our praying are too small. Our expectations are too limited." J. Hudson Taylor observed, "Many Christians estimate difficulties in the light of their own resources, and thus attempt little and often fail in the little they attempt."
Jesus sets the example, and Paul calls the church, to a religion of positive, affirmative, hopeful commitment to the future.

But we are not called to make commitments toward unattainable goals. Someone has suggested the following rules for resolution-making and goal-setting:

1. Cut your lofty goals in half.
2. Be specific about your goals.
3. Write down how you will do it.
4. Don't make too many resolutions.
5. Keep your goals realistic.
6. Consider finding a partner.
7. Keep track of your progress.
8. Think of each new day as a new beginning.

The Scottish Presbyterian author George H. Morrison similarly cautions about the subject of our goals:

When we are foolish, we want to conquer the world; when we are wise, we want to conquer self. Our life is measured not by what we win; our life is measured by the thing we strive for.

Jesus sets the example, and Paul calls the church, to a religion of positive, affirmative, hopeful commitment to the future.

Another word of caution about goals comes from author Charles Swindoll. He relates the following story in his book Dropping Your Guard (Insight for Living, September 1998):

It was Flight 401 bound for Miami from New York City with a load of holiday passengers. As the huge aircraft approached the Miami Airport for its landing, a light that indicates proper deployment of the landing gear failed to come on. The plane flew in a large, looping circle over the swamps of the Everglades while the cockpit crew checked out the light failure. Their question was this, had the landing gear actually not deployed or was it just the light bulb that was defective?

To begin with, the flight engineer fiddled with the bulb. He tried to remove it, but it wouldn't budge. Another member of the crew tried to help out and then another. By and by, if you can believe it, all eyes were on the little light bulb that refused to be dislodged from its socket. No one noticed that the plane was losing altitude. Finally, it dropped right into a swamp. Many were killed in that plane crash. While an experienced crew of high-priced and seasoned pilots messed around with a seventy-five-cent light bulb, an entire airplane and many of its passengers were lost. The crew momentarily forgot the most basic of all rules of the air "Don't forget to fly the airplane!"

The same thing can happen to the local church. The preacher and elders can be so busy fighting petty fires and focusing so much of their attention on insignificant issues that they lose sight of what church is all about. The church can have so many activities, programs, projects, committee meetings, banquets, and community involvements so many wheels spinning without really accomplishing anything of eternal significance that the congregation forgets its primary objective.

Many churches are like that impressive invention which had hundreds of wheels, coils, gears, pulleys, belts, bells and lights which all went around and around and flashed at the touch of a button. When the inventor was asked about the function of the weird machine, he replied, "What does it do? Oh, it doesn't do anything, but doesn't it run beautifully?"

Swindoll concludes:

Let's not be like Flight 401 or the invention that doesn't do anything! Our primary objective is to win this lost world to Jesus Christ.

Jesus sets the example, and Paul calls the church, to a religion of positive, affirmative, hopeful commitment to the future.

As a congregation we have set ourselves the goal, the objective, the vision, the mission, whatever you want to call it, of "inviting others to join us in proclaiming the Gospel through worship, prayer, learning and reaching out in mission and ministry." That is a lofty goal! I suggest to you that it is also a positive, hopeful, expansive, realistic, self-directed, world- winning goal. We are called, as Paul wrote to the Ephesians, to know and to share "the riches of [Christ's] glorious inheritance" and "the immeasurable greatness of [God's] power." This is the commitment to the future that we have set for ourselves. I believe that, as Paul wrote, God’s answer to our doing so is "Yes."

As we begin this new year, let us renew our vision, our mission, our goal. Let us heed Paul's affirmative call and follow the example set by our Lord to participate in God’s redemptive work by making an ever-greater commitment and effort to "invite others to join us in proclaiming the Gospel through worship, prayer, learning and reaching out in mission and ministry." Amen.

A Simple Matter -- Sermon for the Sixth Sunday after Epiphany, Year B

I remember years ago reading a book about medical missionaries in Africa. I remember that Albert Schweitzer figured prominently in the book, but I can't recall the title or the author; it may have been Dr. Schweitzer himself. All I remember from the book, really, was an observation by one of the missionaries about the reaction of the peoples to whom they offered assistance. It seems the western medical treatment of disease was simply too simple. The attitude of their patients seemed to be one of distrust because the medical missionaries did not engage in the sort of complicated rituals the patients expected.

Consider. The missionaries gave the patients a drink from a bottle, or a pill, or perhaps (and most dramatically) an injection. Compare this with the treatment offered by the local faith practitioners (the men and women we westerners pejoratively call "witch doctors"). These folks burned smelly things, chanted, danced, rubbed the body of potions of all sorts, and so forth. This is what the patients thought was needed to cure disease. A drink from a bottle, or a pill, or an injection ... well! It was just too simple. Couldn't possibly work!

That's what's going on it the story of Naaman the leper and his cure by Elisha. Naaman, an Aramean general, hears from a captive Israelite girl that he might be cured if he goes to Israel. So he goes to the king of Israel, who hasn't a clue how to cure him and reacts rather negatively. But Elisha, the man of God, hears about this and sends a message to the king of Israel saying, "Send Naaman to me."

So Naaman goes to see Elisha. And what does Elisha do? He doesn't even see him; he has a servant tell him, "Bathe in the River Jordan." This is too simple. Naaman wants a show; he wants the prophet to "come out, and stand and call on the name of the Lord his God, and wave his hand over the spot and cure the leprosy!" And Naaman starts to go off in a huff.
However, Naaman's servants confront him and say, basically: "Look! If he'd told you do something difficult, you'd have done it. Why don't you at least try this easy thing?" So Naaman goes and bathes and is cured. It's just so simple.

The Gospel story is the same. A leper comes to Jesus and says, "You can make me clean." Like Naaman, he probably expects some fancy-shmancy ritual or difficult task or something. What he gets is Jesus saying, "Yep. I can. You're clean." It's so simple! And Jesus wants it to stay that way, so he says, "Keep quiet about this. Just show yourself to the priests and make the required offering."

Of course, the former leper is unable to keep his mouth shut and goes about spreading the word so that Jesus can't even openly enter a town without being mobbed. Like Naaman the Old Testament leper, like those Africans, and a lot like you and me, the New Testament leper isn't comfortable with simplicity.

And, yet, simplicity is at the heart of our faith. Sure, we have a lot of doctrines and dogmas, many of them very important. Sure, we have a lot of ritual and ceremony, much of it very important. But at the heart of the Christian faith is something very, very simple.

Karl Barth was a Swiss theologian, born in Basel, Switzerland. He studied at Bern, Berlin, Tubingen, and Marburg. While pastor at Safenwil, Aargau, he wrote a commentary on St Paul's Epistle to the Romans (1919) which caused something of a revolution in theology and established his theological reputation. He became professor at Gottingen (1921), Munster (1925), and Bonn (1930), but when he refused to take an unconditional oath to Hitler, he was dismissed and had to leave Germany. Thus, he became professor at Basel (1935--62). His theology emphasized the finiteness of man, and God's unquestionable authority and "otherness". His many works include the monumental Kirchliche Dogmatik (Church Dogmatics, 4 volumes, 1932-67).

A story is told about Karl Barth that several years after the Second World War he was asked by an American audience to summarize the gist of his enormous books on theology. After just a couple of moments of reflection, the learned man quoted from a familiar song: "Jesus loves me, this I know, for the Bible tells me so." You see, at the heart of it all, underlying the thousands of pages of doctrine, dogma and theology written by Professor Barth and countless other theologians, is this simplest of all truths: "Jesus loves me."

We human beings are very leery of simplicity. We thrive on complicating things; complexity fascinates us and so we complicate our religions, our businesses, our families and our lives. In recent years, we have seen the birth of movement called "voluntary simplicity." It's really nothing new.... Jesus taught it as did many other religious sages; the most revered saints, such as Francis of Assisi, Benedict of Nursia, and our own patron, Paul, have taught and lived simplicity.

A few years ago I read an article by a woman named Catherine A. Thiemann entitled A Simple Heart in which she said:

[Voluntary simplicity] starts with a simple heart. And a simple heart starts with exploring why you are here on earth. You and I might have different perspectives on the purpose of life. That doesn't matter. What matters is that you begin the process of knowing why you are here. Without knowing that, it will be more difficult to have a simple heart. Although you might achieve a frugal lifestyle, you will not achieve simplicity.

In a simple life, all elements work toward life's ultimate purpose. Any element that doesn't work toward this goal becomes an obstacle. For example, my life's purpose is to know and follow the will of God. One obstacle is my many possessions. The individual items are innocent in themselves, but collectively demand too much of my time and attention. They distract me from the purpose to which I am called. As I shed my possessions, I free myself to hear God's will more clearly and do it more willingly.

But simplicity is not merely a lack of possessions. A simple life is an outward sign of a simple heart. When you focus your heart on your reason for being, you will begin to lose your appetite for the clutter in your life. You may find television less appealing, or rich foods, or popular magazines. You may find the "urge to buy" becoming less urgent. Without a simple heart, "voluntary simplicity" is an exercise in self-denial. With a simple heart, the "self" becomes less important, and therefore self-denial less painful.

She's right on, of course. Simplicity starts with the heart, with exploring why you, why each of us, are here on earth. Several years ago, Christian author Gordon McDonald wrote a book entitled The Life God Blesses: Weathering the Storms of Life That Threaten the Soul (Thomas Nelson Publishers, 1994). In it, McDonald suggested five questions to test one's spiritual health:

1. Who are you trying to please?

2. What insecurities are you pampering?

3. With whom or what are you competing?

4. What rewards are you seeking?

5. What shame are you covering?

Those are darned good questions to ask when one is exploring, as Thiemann suggests, the beginning of a simple heart: "Why you are here on earth?"

Somewhere in the answers to those questions, somewhere in the simple heart, one will hear the voice of the Lord. It is in the midst of our complicated lives that we need to pause and ask ourselves those questions, to seek that simplicity in which we can listen carefully for the Lord's greeting and guidance.

I sometimes find in the stories of the rabbis of eastern Europe, the Hasidim, the most enlightening of teachings. Martin Buber, the Jewish philosopher and theologian, collected many of those stories. One is about a certain Rabbi Zusya, whose comment reflects, I think, an appreciation of simplicity. He is said to have once remarked, "In the coming world, they will not ask me: 'Why were you not Moses?' They will ask me, 'Why were you not Zusya?'" To be one's self, one's own sweet simple self, who is loved by God who has put you on earth for a reason ... that is what life and faith are all about.

At its heart, in our heart, religion is a simple matter.

"Go and wash."

"Yep, I can do that; you're healed."

"Jesus loves me, this I know, for the Bible tells me so."

Amen.

Loneliness & Solitude: An Unpreached Sermon

The following is the sermon I wrote for February 5. I didn't preach it. Because the night before my dog Josephine, who had been battling histocytic sarcoma for several months, had become very sick and early in the morning I knew I had no choice but to take her to the 24-hour emergency veterinary hospital and help her cross over the barrier that separates life from death. My wife and I held her in our arms as the vet administered the overdose of a sedative, both us in tears as the pain ... and then the sparkle of life ... left her eyes.

Instead of preaching this sermon, I sat on the chancel steps with the children of the parish and we talked about losing pets. I told them how I had cried but how was nonetheless grateful to God for the ten years Josey had been a part of my life, for the unconditional love she had given me, and for the good memories I will always have.

Today (Feb. 6) was the first day in many years that I went to the office completely without her (sometimes when Evelyn would be staying home for the day, she would not go with me, but I always went to work knowing she'd greet me when I returned home). It's not that Josey ever did anything other than sleep ... and greet the occasional visitor ... but the office just seemed less friendly without her there.

I miss her ... I'm sure I always will.

Anyway ... hear's the unpreached sermon.


Today we heard in the Gospel reading that, after healing Peter’s mother-in-law of some disease, dining in her home, and spending the night there, Jesus "got up [early in the morning,] ... went out to a deserted place, and there he prayed.

This is not the first, nor will it be the last time, Jesus goes away by himself. Jesus seems to be a man who enjoys being by himself, who finds comfort in solitude. Whenever he has had a period of significant public activity, he goes away to some quiet place to pray, to meditate, to rest, and to replenish his energy. Jesus would be described by modern psychologists as "introversive."

Jesus' experience of being alone in the wilderness can be described, and thereby understood, in a variety of ways depending upon which of the various synonyms for the condition of "alone-ness" one chooses to use. Among those synonyms are solitude, retirement, seclusion, isolation, and loneliness. As I have scanned the dictionaries, this is what I have learned:

Solitude describes the fact that a person is alone; it literally means "being by one's self." (Keep that mention of "self" in mind; I'll come back to it in a minute.)

Retirement is a voluntary withdrawal from general society, implying that a person has been engaged in its activities.

Seclusion, that he is shut out from others, usually by his own choice.

Isolation emphasizes total separation or detachment from others, and is usually involuntary.

Lonely literally means "to be one," "being without a companion," and carries a connotation of sadness.

Except for solitude, all of these words have negative connotations: retirement is the opposite of an active, public life; seclusion is the opposite of being freely accessible to others; isolation is the opposite of being accepted in society; and loneliness is the opposite of that enjoyment of society which the heart demands.

It seems to me that how we perceive Jesus' "alone-ness" depends on our own comfort with the idea of being alone. If one is not comfortable apart from others, one may see Jesus as "lonely" or as "isolated". On the other hand, those who are comfortable to be "by themselves" will perceive his experience as "retirement" into "seclusion". Perhaps it is a matter of whether one is able to perceive the companionship and comfort of God the Holy Spirit or the protection of God the Father in times of "alone-ness". Clearly, Jesus was able to do so, even when his solitude was interrupted by the assaults of the Tempter. This seems to be the very reason he goes off into the desert alone so often.

I want to contrast two of these terms in particular, solitude and loneliness, and I want to do so first by using a little linguistic study. I believe there is great truth in language, in its underlying meanings, and in its origins; that is why I frequently lead you down the path of Greek and Hebrew word study. Today, let's take a brief walk down the path of English word study because in the origins of these two words, loneliness and solitude, I think we can find a significant spiritual truth.

I asked you a moment ago to keep in mind the literal meaning of solitude as "being by one's self." This word derives from an Indo-European root "s(w)e-" (pronounced "swoh-") meaning "self" and from which our cognate words s-o-l-e and s-o-u-l are derived. In other words, solitude, as a describer of alone- ness, is rooted in a spiritual concept, the concept of self or soul.
On the other hand, lonely is derived from the ancient word root "oi-no" which means simply "one," a mathematical unit. It has nothing to do with self-hood or the soul. In its origins the word lonely is devoid of spiritual overtones. One philosophical writer touched on this when she wrote:
"Loneliness is a fact of life. Loneliness is not just the result of being alone. It can be felt while with another or with many. Loneliness is the resulting experience of separation from the self. Until you have learned to connect continuously with your essential Self, you are prone to loneliness. " (This comment was found on the web, but the site is no longer functioning.)

"Essential self" is a Greek philosophical concept; it was a term Aristotle used to describe the human pneuma (pneuma) or spirit. Loneliness, then, is total alone-ness; it is a detachment not only from other people, but from one's own spiritual being. This is why it is the first thing referred to in Scripture as being "not good":

Then the Lord God said, "It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him a helper as his partner." (Genesis 2:18, NRSV)

Throughout the Bible, many people suffer the anguish of loneliness. The Psalmist describes loneliness when he writes:

I look to my right hand and find no one who knows me; *
I have no place to flee to, and no one cares for me. (Psalm 142:4, BCP version)

Jonah and Elijah both felt loneliness (and anger) such that they begged to die. Elijah went out into the desert, sat beneath a solitary tree and prayed, "It is enough; now, O Lord, take away my life, for I am no better than my ancestors." (1 Kings 19:4) Jonah did much the same thing when he felt abandoned by God: "He said, 'It is better for me to die than to live.'" (Jonah 4:8)

The Prophet Jeremiah, too, felt the pangs of loneliness when he felt separated from God:

I did not sit in the company of merrymakers, nor did I rejoice; under the weight of your hand I sat alone, for you had filled me with indignation. Why is my pain unceasing, my wound incurable, refusing to be healed? Truly, you are to me like a deceitful brook, like waters that fail. (Jeremiah 15:17-18)

All these are examples of the pain and anguish of loneliness. Loneliness is destructive.

Solitude, on the other hand, is the creative experience of being always in the Presence of God even when completely apart from the rest of the world. Solitude is the experience the Psalmist writes of in Psalm 139:1-7:

Lord, you have searched me out and known me; *
you know my sitting down and my rising up; you discern my thoughts from afar.
You trace my journeys and my resting-places *
and are acquainted with all my ways.
Indeed, there is not a word on my lips, *
but you, O Lord, know it altogether.
You press upon me behind and before *
and lay your hand upon me.
Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; *
it is so high that I cannot attain to it.
Where can I go then from your Spirit? *
where can I flee from your presence?
If I climb up to heaven, you are there; *
if I make the grave my bed, you are there also.
Knowledge of the companionship of God is the solution for loneliness.

Jesus knew that companionship in the desert. In John's Gospel, as he talks with the Twelve at the Last Supper, he describes how that sense of God's Presence is still with him:

The hour is coming, indeed it has come, when you will be scattered, each one to his home, and you will leave me alone. Yet I am not alone because the Father is with me. (John 16:32)

How can we come to have this sense of God's Presence in our lives? How can we who strive to follow Jesus follow him in this way, as well?

We can do so in community. The Apostle John, in his first catholic epistle, said that we learn to love God whom we cannot see by loving our brothers and sisters whom we can see. (1 John 4:20) In the same way, we learn to appreciate the companionship of God, the comfort of the Holy Spirit, the protection of the Father, through experiencing the companionship, comfort, and protection of our brothers and sisters in the People of God. This is, perhaps, why God enjoined celebration and companionship upon his people.

In the Book of Deuteronomy, they are told to gather together to celebrate annually their liberation from Egypt, and this celebration and companionship is to reach beyond their own families and communities and embrace the alien, the stranger, and the foreigner who may also be dwelling in their land. (Deut. 26:11)

A modern poet once wrote a love song in which he thanked his beloved for that gift. I won't try to sing the song for you, but these are the lyrics:

You have brought me solitude,
And I believe it is the time
for me to show some gratitude.
I think I'll take a minute
to reflect upon your attitude,
But most of all I love the way
that you have brought me solitude.

You have been a friend to me,
And I believe it is the time
for me to show some sympathy.
I watch the way you suffer
with the problems only I can see,
But most of all I love the way
that you have been a friend to me.

You have been misunderstood,
And I believe it is the time
for you to feel the way you should.
I'd love to see you smile a while
and know that you were feeling good,
But mostly I regret the way
that you have been misunderstood.

You have been a friend to me,
And I believe it is the time
for me to show some sympathy.
I watch the way you suffer
with the problems only I can see,
But most of all I love the way
that you have been a friend to me.

You have brought me solitude,
you have brought me solitude ...

Surprisingly enough, that was written by Frank Zappa for his wife Gale (circa 1975). As far as I know, it is the only love song he ever composed.

Loneliness is destructive. Solitude is creative. Pablo Picasso, the great Spanish painter, once remarked, "Without great solitude no serious work is possible." Frances Steloff, the famous New York bookseller, voiced a similar thought when she said, "You need solitude if you are going to fulfill your promises."

Jesus found the energy and Spirit to fulfill his promise in solitude. May each of us, as we make our occasional journeys through the places of alone-ness, find them experiences not of discouraging loneliness but of fertile solitude. Amen.