May 5, 2024
Sixth Sunday of Easter
Good morning, Seekers.
I want to thank the Celebration Circle for inviting me to bring the message this morning, and for my close friends who have kept me connected to this community in a variety of ways.
Moment of Silence
May the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in thy sight, Holy One!
THEME: RESURRECTING FAITH
We live in turbulent and frightening times, and when Jeanne asked if I would bring the message, what was top of mind for me was how are we who are followers of Jesus to weather times like these.
We are commanded to love the Lord our God with our whole heart, our whole soul, and our whole mind. We are to love ourselves, and love our neighbor as ourselves. (Matt. 26:36-40) And we are to love our enemies, do good to those who hate us; bless those who curse us; and pray for those who despitefully use us (Luke 6: 27-38).
How are we to do this when:
We face the dismantling of our already flawed democratic system; We face the expansion of white supremacist policies and practices; a resurgence and intensification of anti-semitism;
We’re experiencing the retraction and retrenchment of hard-won voting rights and reproductive rights;
We are witnessing the abuse of an interminably slow-paced legal system that threatens society’s ability to hold those charged with criminal behavior to account;
We are held hostage by a dysfunctional federal legislature, a politicized federal Supreme Court, and a foreign policy that upholds alliances incapable of prioritizing the sanctity of human life over the preservation of political, economic and military advantage.
What are we supposed to do as we watch:
Glaciers melting at a rapid pace;
Sea levels rising and swallowing island nations and low-lying communities;
Warming oceans and increasing salinization of our waters;
Millions of climate-affected migrants who can no longer remain in their communities due to flooding, drought, famine, war;
More-than-human species losing their habitats because of our greed and loss of reverence for the land, the waters and the air, and those beings with whom we share the earth.
These are among the dangers we face today, and when Jeanne asked me to come to Seekers, the first thing I heard was Rev. James Cleveland singing:
“Master, the tempest is raging, The billows are tossing high.
The sky, is o’er shadowed with blackness, No shelter or help is nigh.”
But Jeanne said that Seeker’s theme for this Easter season is “Resurrecting Faith,” and I can’t think of a better theme to explore for times like these.
MARK 4: 35-41
Rev. Cleveland, the songwriter, wrote these lyrics based on the fourth chapter of Mark, verses 35-41, and I offer it as a companion to our scripture readings this morning (this is from the New Revised Standard version).
“On that day, when evening had come, he said to them, “Let us cross to the other side.” And leaving the crowd behind, they took him with them in the boat, just as he was. Other boats were with him. A great windstorm arose, and the waves beat into the boat, so that the boat was already being swamped. But he was in the stern asleep on the cushion; and they woke him up and said to him “Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?” He woke up and rebuked the wind, and said to the sea, “Peace be still!” Then the wind ceased, and there was a dead calm. He said to them, “Why are you afraid? Have you still no faith?” And they were filled with great awe and said to one another, “Who then is this, that even the wind and the sea obey him?”
Jesus had just come from teaching a large crowd of his followers in parables about the Kingdom of God, and his practice was to teach in parables to the masses, then explain in greater detail what the teachings meant in private to his closest followers. I can imagine that after a day of teaching large crowds, Jesus was tired and in this account, we find him in the boat sound asleep.
WARNING: Covenant honors the Bible as a treasury of insights, and we interpret these insights in a manner that provides useful guidance and inspiration for our lives today.
So here in the boat were the closest followers of Jesus — folks he had chosen to be with him—folks who had heard him teach with authority, seen him cast out demons, watched him heal the sick, cleanse lepers and restore mobility to the lame. Here were folks he was grooming to be
fishers of men, to witness his works so that greater works than these, they would be able to accomplish. Here were folks whose states of consciousness he was trying to change so that when he was no longer with them, they could carry on his legacy.
These followers trusted in Jesus’ ability to work miracles, reverse adverse circumstances and change external conditions. So when the windstorms threatened their safety and they feared imminent death, their first instinct was to run to him in the hope that he could somehow intervene and reverse these dangerous circumstances.
I want to pause here for a moment.
These followers wanted to be in his presence but up until this point, while they were aware of the miracles he’d performed, had not witnessed him exert power over forces nature, and when they awakened him and saw him calm the wind and still the sea, notice how astonished they were, asking themselves in effect, “Who does this, that even the wind and sea obey him?”
It occurs to me that there are two tempests here, one external and one internal: One representing Jesus’ followers’ states of consciousness consumed by external conditions; and one representing Jesus’ state of consciousness in alignment with what is eternal and at peace no matter the surrounding environment.
When Jesus comes topside, his first act was to address the external turbulence, the wind and the seas. I wonder if his presence, in fact, had the immediate impact of addressing his followers’ fears, making the wind and the seas now appear less threatening.
He then turned to them and directly addressed their internal turbulence, asking, “Why are you afraid? Have you still no faith?” Jesus’ expectations of these followers was that their having walked with him, witnessed his
works and embraced his teachings would have instilled enough faith in them that this incident would not have unsettled them this much. Notice he asks, “Have you still no faith?” They had become so frightened that they had assumed their demise, having asked, “Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing,” not if we perish.
Jesus wasn’t expecting these followers to change the weather conditions outside, he was expecting their faith to change their internal weather conditions…the conditions inside their hearts and minds; their fear, their anxiety and their impending sense of doom.
This is the faith Jesus asks of us who have been sent for just such a time as this. So many of our tumultuous societal storms seem out of our control and too massive to handle like the winds and the waves in this scripture. In times like these, our first task is to go deep inside the ship of our own being and awaken the Jesus presence; resurrect that faith in our own divinity, which is always at peace, and still the turbulence that destroys our ability to effectively weather our circumstances.
The Jesus who resides in our spirits, hearts and minds inspires us to reignite our faith and remember his teaching, that the Kingdom of God is within us (Luke 17:21); that we are spirit first, and have the ability, while in his presence, to still our fears and calm our anxiety as we navigate the perilous times of this 21st century. We can then unleash the energy we need to make a difference in the conditions we can change, and endure those over which we have no control.
CAPTAIN BILL PINKNEY (Sept. 15, 1935 to Aug. 31, 2023)
I’d like your permission to share about a real live example, that of one who has braved both external and internal storms with faith during a journey he described as a visible metaphor for life.
William Deloris Pinkney III, best known as Captain Bill Pinkney, was an African American man from the south side of Chicago. I met Captain Bill during a meeting of the National Maritime Heritage Foundation, and again later while serving on the Board of the Howard University Middle School of Mathematics and Science. We invited him to be the school’s inaugural commencement speaker.
Captain Bill became the first African American to circumnavigate the globe via the southern capes. [Terry Seymour became the first African American to circumnavigate the globe via the route through the Suez and Panama Canals in 1987.]
In his film “The Incredible Voyage of Bill Pinkney,” and his book As Long As It Takes: Meeting the Challenge, he tells of his trip that took five years to plan and raise money for. He undertook this voyage out of his sense of adventure, but more importantly, to demonstrate to children from backgrounds like his (lower income, single parent urban households), that they can achieve their dreams if they stay serious about their education, dream boldly, and do what it takes to make their dreams come true, not letting anything deter them from success.
THE VOYAGE
In 1990, Captain Bill set out at the age of 55 in his 47 foot Valiant cutter that he named Commitment. The trip covered 32,000 miles and took 22 months to complete. Like Jesus’ apostles, he faced enormous dangers that we learn about in greater detail than we find in the account in Mark.
First of all, Captain Bill sailed alone, and while there is nothing that describes him as religious, he was clearly a man of faith. He talks about having to come to grips with the possibility that on such a long trip, he could face death at any point, and die alone. He described to his wife how just falling asleep on his small craft while traveling in the major shipping lanes in the southern hemisphere, could be perilous.
He risked having his 21,000-pound glass reinforced plastic vessel being crushed by the 3 million ton steel hulled ocean-going freight hauling ships.
The ocean he described as “…an all-powerful force that is relentless…” was different from the waters that Jesus’ followers were in, and presented unique challenges, including pods of pilot whales and 30 foot waves that turned his craft over at a 45 degree angle, requiring him to wear two chain harnesses to keep him from going overboard.
He faced hurricanes and squalls that lasted for days on end and sometimes threw him off course, damaged his boat, shredded his sails, and broke his navigation instruments and communications systems.
He endured long periods of dead calm waters, isolation, boredom, anxiety and fear.
He became ill for four days and occasionally made some mistakes in sailing, like forgetting to turn on the radar alarm which almost resulted in a collision with a giant Chinese fishing vessel.
AND YET
Captain Bill had faith in his God, in himself, his experience at sea, in his craft and in his purpose, that no matter what the external or internal conditions he met, he would succeed in completing his journey and fulfilling his goal.
I want to be clear here. Captain Bill didn’t still the hurricane-force winds and calm the seas that swamped his boat and turned it on a 45 degree angle. No. His faith calmed his inner landscape so he could manage his outer conditions.
He tells of holding onto the verses in Psalm 107: 23-30 which read how:
“Some went down to the sea in ships, doing business on the mighty waters; they saw the deeds of the Lord, his wondrous works in the deep. For he commanded and raised the stormy wind, which lifted up the waves of the sea. They mounted up to heaven, they went down to the depths; their courage melted away in their calamity; they reeled and staggered like drunkards, and were at their wits’ end. Then they cried to the Lord in their trouble, and he brought them out from their distress; he made the storm be still, and the waves of the sea were hushed. Then they were glad because they had quiet.”
Captain Bill’s voyage is a testament to what Seekers’ scripture readings today describe:
The Holy Spirit was present with him every bit as much as it was with the Jews and the Gentiles in the tenth chapter of Acts. It was there with him in the dead calm and was there with him in the storms.
The author of Psalm 98 writes that the ends of the earth have seen the victory of God, and Captain Bill, having sailed to the ends of the earth returned home to tell of that victory—-most noteworthy of which was sailing around Cape Horn, one of the most dangerous sea passages on earth.
Captain Bill knew himself to be born of God, and in 1 John 5:4, it says that, “… those born of God conquer the world, and this is the victory that conquers the world, our faith.” Captain Bill’s voyage is a testament to that faith.
Finally, Jesus gave his apostles his commandment in John 15:12, “… that you love one another as I have loved you…” Bill Pinkney’s purpose for circumnavigating the globe was an act of love. He remained in contact with middle school children in Boston and Chicago daily
throughout his journey, sending back live video coverage of his trip and coordinating with their math, science, social studies and geography teachers the curriculum enhancements that helped their classes come alive. He allowed them to see him when he was dancing in Salvador, despairing during periods of dead calm, and celebrating on rounding Cape Horn. These young people came to personally identify with him and learn what true commitment to one’s dream meant in real life.
Love one another as I have loved you.
In the stillness, we drop anchor into our divinity. We refresh, renew and resurrect our faith as we face the turmoil that surrounds us and threatens our serenity. In the silence, we hush the hostility, dispel the despair, and in faith, go on to fulfill our purpose, changing what we can change, enduring what we cannot, as radiant temples of pure being made in your image and likeness. Amen.
