“Improvisational Christians”
A sermon by Sid Burgess for Edgewood Presbyterian Church, Birmingham, AL
Easter Sunday, April 4, 2010
It has been a year—12 long months—since all of us have been together here in this sanctuary. And what a year it has been! Some triumph, some tragedy; some gains, some losses. For many of us this past year has required a good bit of flexibility, a fair amount of adaptation to change.
In the arts—in music and drama—responding to the unexpected is called improvisation— “creating on the fly.” Truth be told we humans rarely get a chance to rehearse the big events in life—the major transitions of birth and death, or growing up and growing old. We don’t get to rehearse being a teenager, or becoming a parent. From young adulthood forward we may think we have the script in hand--“best laid plans of mice and men”-- but then come the unexpected injures or illnesses; the surprising good fortune or the staggering losses; the blossoming of love or the disintegration of relationships. In each situation, if we are to find a way forward—note the the conjunction of if and forward—If we find a way forward we mortals are required to improvise. Failure to adapt to change—failure to improvise— will ultimately lead to stagnation. Like toddlers learning to walk— standing up, stepping out, falling down, getting up again . . . . When we fall, we either get up and start over, maybe even heading in a direction we never intended to go, or we plop back down on our behinds, never to see around the next corner.
I bring these self-evident truths to your attention on this Easter Sunday because improvising is what the Gospel writers are doing as they try to convey to us—across more than two millennia---what happened on that mysterious third day after the crucifixion of Jesus. When the women arrived at the tomb on that first Easter morning, Luke says, "Suddenly two men in dazzling clothes stood beside them." But that is at odds with what the other three Gospel writers report. The earliest account, in the Gospel of Mark, says simply that the women "saw a young man—just one person--dressed in a white robe." The Gospel of Matthew reports an earthquake which you would think would be pretty hard to overlook. But the other gospel writers seem to know nothing about it. Matthew also says that the women were greeted, not by a man or men but by an “angel of the Lord, descending from heaven." And the Gospel of John says that Mary, coming alone to the tomb, was greeted by "two angels in white,” plus the Risen Jesus, apparently dressed in work clothes.
One young man arrayed in white, says Mark, Two men in dazzling attire, says Luke. One angel plus a powerful earthquake, says Matthew. Two angels plus the Risen Jesus, says John.
Dr. Homer Henderson, a retired UCC pastor out in California, who serves this Easter Sunday as preacher to this preacher, sees the apparent contradictions here as improvisations! These four accounts in the Gospels are improvisations on the same major theme: “Christ is risen! Christ is risen indeed!”1 What is central, and what is without contradiction, is this main theme of resurrection. Like skilled musicians, each Gospel writer adds grace notes—grace notes like dazzling angels or a crescendo like an earthquake or codas like an mysterious appearance, all of which augment the major theme that, in Christ, death no longer has dominion. Neither life nor death can separate us from the love of God and in Christ we shall all be made alive; everyone in Christ is a new creation. The four Gospels are marvelous, inspired improvisations on the Good News. 2
What they are not, popular religion nothwithstanding . . . . The gospel stories are not press reports filed by eye witness reporters. I like to remind folks there was no “press bus” following Jesus and his disciples--no “pool reporters” supplying details as the events unfolded. Instead, the gospls are the inspired confessions of faith that evolved, over decades, through different faith communities, in different parts of the Mediterranean world. They are divinely inspired products of first century churches responding to different situations, different circumstances—improvising, if you will, as they bear witness to their commonly held belief that the One who was once dead now lives.
All of our attempts to force conformity, especialy in matters of religious faith: “it’s my way or the highway”. . . . All attempts to force conformity ignore St. Paul’s sacred witness:
Now there are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit;
5and there are varieties of services, but the same Lord;
6and there are varieties of activities,
but it is the same God who activates all of them in everyone (1 Cor.
12. 4f)
One Spirit, one Lord, one God. That is the major theme. Varieties of gifts, varieties of services and activities, even varieties of biblical interpretation--all inspired by the same God. This is the Church in faithful improvisation.
Jesus does exactly the same thing in his teaching. When asked, "Which commandment is the greatest?" (Matt. 22.34-40) Jesus patches together two passages of Hebrew scripture. Love the Lord your God, from Deuteronomy (6.5) and love your neighbor as yourself from Leviticus (19.18). On these two commandments, he says, hang all the law and the prophets. In other words, all the rest is commentary for love is the major theme. All the rest is improvisation. Christian faith and Christian living are improvisations on love. Love of God, respect of neighbor, and acceptance of self.
Christian faith is just that—faith. It is not a set of strict rules and regs. Not a bunch of line-in-the-sand doctrines—believe this, believe that, or roast in hell. In the practice of Christianity, “we walk by faith and not by sight.” In other words, we improvise. ‘And Momma never said it was going to be easy.’
Admittedly, there are those times when a little bit of certainty would go a long way. Your loved one dies and you're cast into the valley of the shadow. You lose your job, your identity in the world . . . . All of those friends you thought you had go silent. No one is returning your phone calls or responding to your emails. Or, the doctor has confirmed that the suspicions are correct—the cancer is back, or the heart is failing. You ask, "Why did this happen? Where is God in all of this? How does my faith help? What do I do now?" For once you’d like some straight answers. And all the preacher can do is offer once again St. Paul’s sacred assurance:
38For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, 39nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord (Romans 8).
I hear you, Mr. Preacher, but "What do I do now?" The answer is, improvise. Do the next thing there is to do--and trust God. Trust God’s everlasting, steadfast, never stopping love for you and for all whom you hold dear.
Of course, it would be nice to have a script to follow, and a director to tell us exactly how to play our parts, when to enter, when to exit, what to say and how to say it, even to tell us how to feel. But most of the time, life’s answer is, "Improvise.” Walk through the doors that open to you, accept the doors that close before you. Do the best you can, and trust the presence of God.
My source, Dr. Henderson, writes
I'm absolutely convinced that the art of faithful improvisation is the key to practicing Christian values in the secular (world). The moral and ethical choices, the dilemmas facing everyone involved in business and commerce and finance, (education) and government just permit no easy answers, no black and white notes composed on a finished score. Those who take Christian values seriously, values that flow from the major themes of loving God, loving neighbor, and loving self . . . . Those Christians, meaning us Christians, (must) improvise everyday.3
One way of reading the Passion stories has a wooden Jesus virtually a puppet on divine strings, strings being pulled by Holy God. In such a reading, Jesus is powerless to alter the course of events in Jerusalem. I read the story quite differently. To to the very, cruel end, I think Jesus is improvising.
Now before you jump out of your pew and start throwing hymnals. think about this: Jesus is playing to an audience of One. Not to the crowds, not to the disciples, not to his family, not to the religious leaders, certainly neither to Pilate nor to Herod, but to God alone.
My prayer for you and for myself and for all of us together as the people of God is that we will faithfully play out our roles as children of God. That we will play neither to the crowds nor to the family, neither to convention nor to radical notions but to the only One who truly matters—the audience of the One true God. We can do this if we believe that God is at work within us and among us. We can do this when we believe that the God at work within us is the very same God who raised Jesus from the dead.
We can live our lives as improvisational Christians, risking love, sharing joys and sorrows, daring to make difficult choices, even challenging entrenched power while humbly serving the least of these . . . . We can do all of this and more because we are convinced that the life God wills for us is stronger than anything else—even death—that might threaten us.
Jesus is Lord!
He has been Lord from the beginning.
He will be Lord at the end.
Even now he is Lord.
1 Henderson, Homer, “Sunday Morning at the Improv,”
Day 1 (formerly, the Protestant Hour), April 11, 2004.
2 Ibid.
3 Ibid.