by Marjorie D. Grevious, Evangelist for Spiritual Healing
Click here to watch the sermon recording on YouTube.
Proverbs 22:6 reads, “Train up a child in the way they should go, And when they are old they will not depart from it.” I share this with you today as I reflect on my sermon writing routine, which has evolved organically in my time with you. I have shared that I grew up in the Black Baptist Church tradition in my hometown of Louisville Kentucky. There was no lectionary, so pastors and preachers often relied on divine inspiration and their own imagination. Music is a very big part of the Black Church experience, even in smaller churches like the one I grew up in, and so I grew up singing in the choir, even going on choir trips, and learning the regular rotation of hymns for Sunday service. My pastor, Rev. Duncan once remarked from the pulpit that he noticed I rarely used the hymnal, yet knew all the words. And he then recited this scripture from Proverbs as a nod to my single mothers parenting skills. (if you don’t know being a single, unwed mother in the ’70s was cause for great shame, so this gesture meant a lot to my mother) Preaching was based on whatever the Holy Spirit moved the preacher to speak on and that made for very interesting sermons.
The Revised Common Lectionary for the Episcopal Church is a wonderful resource as it grounds and focuses me as I gather my scattered thoughts and emotions every month. It offers: The Collect, the First Lesson, a Psalm, an Epistle, and the Gospel, all following the liturgical calendar. All of this is rich source material for a sermon. Enter into this divine order my always disorganized brain which offers me a tsunami of ideas that begins as the very opposite of the hopefully logical, rational, and motivational presentation that comes before you most first Sundays. In the midst of reading through the lectionary, and supporting texts online, and from my seminary textbooks, the first thing to happen is a song. A church song will come to my mind and fill me up as I continue to read through that Sunday’s lesson plan from the lectionary. So much so that I often YouTube the song to make sure that it is what I remember from my days as a church girl. Then I get caught up in the song, the emotions, the holy spirit, and the message it is trying to tell me. This time I went down a rabbit hole. Come with me…
The song is not always directly correlated with the lectionary text. The Holy Spirit has a great sense of humor and all the time in the world, while I have to get a sermon ready by a certain date and time. The song just comes to me and I have learned to lean into the chaos of my imagination as I discern the inspiration that the Holy Spirit is downloading within me to share with you. This month the song was Lead Me, Guide Me by Doris Akers. The chorus goes: “Lead me, guide me, along the way-for if you lead me I cannot stray. Lord let me walk each day with thee. Lead me, Oh Lord, lead me…” I played it several times on repeat and then I thought perhaps it’s leading me to who wrote the song-maybe their life story has a hidden message in it. Doris Akers was born on May 21st 1923 in Brookfield Missouri to a white father, and Black mother. She was credited to have written over 500 songs as an African American gospel music composer, singer, and arranger. She was known as a pioneering “black gospel songwriter” who bridged racial divides. Known for hits like “Sweet, Sweet Spirit” and “Lead Me, Guide Me,” along with co-writing “You Can’t Beat God Giving” with the great Mahalia Jackson, she was honored by the Smithsonian Institution in 1992 as the foremost black gospel songwriter in the US. She co- founded the Sky Pilot Choir in Los Angeles, an integrated group that helped bridge racial gaps in church music during the 1950s. As a teenager the soul singer, Billy Preston would sit in as organist. Doris Akers was inducted into both the Gospel Music Hall of Fame and the Southern Gospel Music Hall of Fame. (https://caamuseum.org/learn/600state/black-history/blackhistory-on-may-21-1923-gospel-music-composer-arranger-and-singer-pioneer-doris-mae-akers-was-born)
As fascinating as this all was, I returned to the lectionary to try and make connections between this song playing in my heart and mind to find the hidden meanings. The Collect from the lectionary is a general prayer on the theme for the scriptures outlined, so further reading is needed. This week the first lesson was the story of Stephen the first Christian martyr. Since we just celebrated the resurrection I wrestled with the difficult theme of martyrdom. What a downer, I thought. Just as spring is unfolding her glory in Minnesota-is this what the people need to hear about as we continue to suffer, and heal from the recent government occupation of our community and the slow but steady dismantling of the Voting Rights Act with the recent Supreme Court decision. Unlike Stephen, I have not yet reached a place of forgiveness for those who would look to purposely harm me, and other marginalized, and disenfranchised people. Saul, who later becomes Paul, bore witness the stoning of Stephen and did nothing. The Psalm had a notation in Latin as to its theme: In te, Domine, speravi “In you, O Lord, I have put my trust” or “In you, Lord, I have placed my hope”. It was the motto of Pope Benedict XV, used to express humble reliance on divine providence. Now things seem to be falling in line and are beginning to make sense. The song is ‘Lead me, Guide me’- In asking to be led, and guided we must have trust and have hope in the guide who is bringing us to a place with which we are unfamiliar yet we believe our divine Leader knows what and where is safe refuge and the best place for us to be spiritually, physically and emotionally. Have you ever been on a guided hike, or walking, or biking tour and thought ‘I am not going to make it!” but you kept going and at the end you are so glad you did. I imagine allowing ourselves to be led and guided by Jesus can be somewhat like that. Exhausting and overwhelming at times, but if we keep going we come into new places of understanding and being.
The Epistle for today in 1Peter is the classic story of the rejected stone symbolizing Christ being used as the cornerstone and believers as the living stones to the spiritual house being built by God . The scriptures that stood out for me from this passage reads: But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s own people, in order that you may proclaim the mighty acts of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. Once you were not a people, but now you are God’s people; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy. I thought about what it means to be God’s people having received His divine mercy. I understood that once I found His marvelous light, it was up to me to help lead those still in darkness to this light. This made me think of one of my favorite New Testament verses in John 13:35–By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.” … Your love for one another will prove to the world that you are my disciples.” This verse consistently reminds me-especially when I feel like I should be doing more- that drawing people to Christ is not about proselytizing, or forcing people to come to church with us. It is about how we treat one another and the light of God’s love that is shared between us that attracts them to that divine love. How can we all love one another better? Does it help to know that the marvelous light of divine love we share with one another is what actually leads others to Christ? It is not what we say, or try to prove, it is in what we do, and how we do it with love, in love.
The gospel reading is often where the sermon really starts to come together for me. After a dozen or more readings of the lectionary page, I most often land on the gospel, because you cannot beat the lessons straight from Christ. John 14 is a gentle farewell, kind of like the long Minnesota goodbye. Jesus is giving this to his fearful disciples whose hearts are troubled by his impending departure. It reads in part: Jesus said, “Do not let your hearts be troubled. Believe in God, believe also in me. In my Father’s house there are many dwelling places. ~ If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, so that where I am, there you may be also. And you know the way to the place where I am going.” Thomas said to him, “Lord, we do not know where you are going. How can we know the way?” Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. If you know me, you will know my Father also. From now on you do know him and have seen him.”It is estimated that for about three years the disciples had been directly led by Jesus. They challenged one another, prayed together, and worked wondrous miracles together. He guided them through God’s divine plan for His life and what that meant for them to teach to all people. These are the ones who had dropped everything to follow him, and yet when it came time for Christ to fulfill his purpose they were confused and frightened to be left without him. This brought me back to the chorus of Lead Me, Guide Me, the part that goes: “for if you lead me I cannot stray. Lord let me walk each day with thee…” Jesus reassures a doubting Thomas that he indeed understands what he needs to in knowing, accepting, and following Christ. So to the incoming new members, but especially to those who are well established in the church, let us remember what we already know -that Jesus is the way, the truth and the life. Let us be guided by the marvelous light of His divine love. Let us remember that we too are disciples leading others by our love for one another. Living life as a Christian following the teachings of Jesus does not change the world, but it changes you and how you move through the world shining light into dark places, loving the marginalized, caring for the disenfranchised, inviting in the discarded. Divine love is life-giving, it is the ultimate truth and the way to God. Not just in the afterlife, but in this life. When you feel lost, and you will, or- trapped in a dark place- which may happen as the chapters of your life unfold, I hope you remember the simple prayer refrain…Lead Me, Oh Lord, Lead Me
