The Ancestors (11.3.19)

The Ancestors
Ephesians 1:11-23
November 3, 2019
Rev. Elizabeth Mangham Lott
St. Charles Ave. Baptist Church

11 In Christ we have also obtained an inheritance, having been destined according to the purpose of him who accomplishes all things according to his counsel and will, 12 so that we, who were the first to set our hope on Christ, might live for the praise of his glory. 13 In him you also, when you had heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and had believed in him, were marked with the seal of the promised Holy Spirit; 14 this is the pledge of our inheritance toward redemption as God’s own people, to the praise of his glory.

15 I have heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love toward all the saints, and for this reason 16 I do not cease to give thanks for you as I remember you in my prayers. 17 I pray that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give you a spirit of wisdom and revelation as you come to know him, 18 so that, with the eyes of your heart enlightened, you may know what is the hope to which he has called you, what are the riches of his glorious inheritance among the saints, 19 and what is the immeasurable greatness of his power for us who believe, according to the working of his great power. 20 God put this power to work in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly places, 21 far above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and above every name that is named, not only in this age but also in the age to come. 22 And he has put all things under his feet and has made him the head over all things for the church, 23 which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all.

We gathered in the courtyard at 9:00 on Friday night. A dozen children and teenagers and almost as many adults. The chiminea was putting out some really great heat, and we could see the s’mores supplies off to the side. But it wasn’t time for that just yet. The twenty of us quieted and recalled the words from the 1st century preacher, “Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles. And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us.”

We named the witnesses who have gone before us who inspire us to live lives of faith and conscience, the ones who taught us the words of scripture and showed us how to live them out with their own actions, and we even named some animal companions who brought us love and comfort and laughter. We remembered there in that space, a space created by folks we did not know who imagined that courtyard into being almost a century ago. A community of faith convened by women in the late 1800s who gathered children together to tell them stories about the love of God. We sat in the sacred circle they created, though we do not even remember their names without flipping through the pages of our history.

I wonder if, in that moment, Beth and Ben and Kathy and Sean and Emily and Kim and Nathan realized they were forming a cloud of witnesses around our young people. They were forming memories of a community of faith that loves and prioritizes and values the life and faith of the next generations. They were adding to the legacy that is the quirky, smart, passionate, edgy St. Charles Ave. Baptist Church. I wonder if they realized the space they are holding for our children (and they are ours, collectively, whether we birthed them or not) is the same space folks were holding 121 years ago in 1898 and, if we get it close to right, a space our children’s children can inhabit decades from now.

Who held that same space for you? Who are your ancestors? Who is in your cloud that helped make you who you are today? Who called out your creativity at a young age? Who noticed your leadership skills and put them to use? Who valued your ideas and opinions and made space for them? Who told you the stories of Jesus and invited you to love your neighbor? Who showed you what that love looks like when it is embodied by someone committed to their practice of faith? Who delighted in your curiosity and precocious questions?

On Friday night, Kathy Randels guided us to remember these ancestors and name aloud people who are in our cloud. She guided us to take a deep breath and then say their names out loud all at the same time. Let’s do that now. And I really, actually, out loud want you to say these names. On the inhale, focus on the names and faces of the people who shaped you who have gone before, and on the exhale, speak their names all at once.

*inhale*

*exhale*

We are drawing a sacred circle around ourselves right now as we do a very brave and tender thing together: remembering our ancestors.

Our remembering is holy as we call to mind the people who have shaped us, the lives cut short and taken from this world too soon, the people who formed our community, the people who leave voids in our lives and gaps in our circle.

But this is a good and necessary practice because it reminds us that we are connected beyond what we can see and we are shaped by more than we can see. I say this because we can be a very “grown-ups” church. And yet, we do not leap into this world as fully formed 75-year-olds. Every one of us learned to hold our heads up, and then to sit and balance our bodies, and then to crawl, and then to pull up and stand, and then to walk. All of that came before learning letters and colors and reading and math. All of that before work and IRAs and a weekend morning with the NYTimes crossword puzzle and a second cup of coffee. 

I’m saying that to remind us that our remembering doesn’t just go backward, though it seems like that’s the direction that remembering must go. Instead, the holy remembering we do today is a loop; taking us backward into the best and truest of what was and then springing back into the now to carry the best and truest with us. Our remembering brings the dead into this sacred circle as we live out their work, their kindness, their grace, their lessons here through our own unfinished stories.

In the letter to the church at Ephesus, Paul writes, “I have heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus, and your love toward all the saints.” The saints he names are the living ones who are embodying the Jesus Way. And Paul prays that their love will grow in wisdom and enlightenment as this young church continues to live out the things the claim to believe. All of these words need bodies to make them real. All of these statements of faith we profess with our lips need daily actions to bring them to life. When we don’t know what that looks like, we need the model of the saints. Either the living ones around us or the ones who went before us and first showed us what faith looks like, and there’s a next step. We don’t just live it out, we also need to be the ones who model for the next generations how faith inspires and informs action in the real world. 

This can be hard work. In fact, our remembering will make us vulnerable because remembering might bring pain to the surface as we touch those bruises of grief within us. But the tender places of our hearts are not shameful; they are necessary, they link us to one another, they link us to God, they link us to the holy ways of compassion, empathy, and loving kindness. In remembering, we may begin to notice the ways we are not embodying faith as we hoped we would. In remembering, we may realize we are prioritizing our own lives and needs rather than the lives and needs of others or the lives and needs of younger ones who are just learning these stories of faith and love and compassion. What Way are we modeling for them to make in this world?

Paul talks about Christ leaving an inheritance for the people who follow him. What is the inheritance of Christ and how do we receive it? We know how estates are closed and settled. We know about receiving a grandmother’s china cabinet or an uncle’s pocket watch. Maybe, if we’re particularly privileged, we know about receiving a surprising financial inheritance. But clearly, Paul isn’t talking about any of this. He is talking about Jesus the Christ being part of that great cloud of witnesses. He is describing Jesus the Christ as an ancestor who has passed and left a legacy for the next generation of the family to receive.

Hope, truth, good news, the wild guiding Spirit of God. This is what we have inherited from Christ. And if we are to embrace the family language being used in this letter (father, son, children, inheritance), then we are part of a connected people that is so much bigger than what we see and know and name. There are all the ones who came before us and then all the ones who come after us. We are not the center of this story but are a piece of it.

I want to challenge you on this All Saints Sunday to consider how you are living into or falling short of your call to participate in the inheritance of Christ, as Paul puts it. How are you sharing this legacy gift with the world? How are you teaching it to the next generation? How are you passing down empathy, grace, loving kindness, patience, peace, self-control, justice, and good news? What are you doing with your one, beautiful life and in this community of faith right here to participate in the legacy of Christ and to pass it on for those who are to come? How will you be remembered as an ancestor in the faith? As one who sits in the great cloud of witnesses?