Could You Write Your Memoir by Focusing on Body Parts?
This was my Palm Sunday Sermon this Year
I have an odd sort of question to ask you this morning. Could you write a memoir of your life by focusing on body parts? Can a tongue. An ear. An eye. A mind tell the story of your life?
Actually, this question might not be so odd after all. I have read in scientific studies that what we do, how we do it, and what happens to us in this life get stored in our body.
Think about it. A tongue. What is it that we have said with our tongue in our life time that was good? What words have we uttered that we wish we could take back? Where has our tongue led us?
Think about it. An ear. What have we heard? Good News? Bad News? How have we reacted? With optimism? Pessimism? A calm faith? Anger? Worry?
Think about it. An eye. What have we seen in our lifetime? When have we seen beauty? Where were we when we saw ugliness? Horror? Grief? Sorrow? What has been our visceral response to what our eye has seen?
Think about it. A mind. What have we thought? How have we responded to what we have said, heard, seen?
How has all of that made us who we are today?
If I ever write a memoir, perhaps I’ll organize it that way, a story about my tongue, my ear, my eye, my mind.
*******
Why am I on about body parts this morning? As I read today’s Scriptures, I kept seeing those body parts, no matter which lesson I read. Isaiah said that God had given him the tongue of a teacher. Every morning God wakes up Isaiah’s ear to hear as those who are taught. Hmmm, I said...Speaking. Listening. Learning. Must be important.
The Psalmist cried out to God for mercy, because his eye is consumed with sorrow. Not only his eye, but also his throat and his belly. He feels like he’s as useless as a broken pot. His enemies plot to take his life. Nevertheless, he professes his faith: “You are my God...Save me in your steadfast love.”
In today’s second lesson, St Paul writes, “Have this mind among you, which you have in Christ Jesus,
who emptied himself in obedience, finding himself in human form. Ultimately relinquishing his tongue, his ear, his throat, his belly, his eye, his cheek, his brow, his body in death on a cross. Why? So that those who have his mind will bend their knee in complete homage to Jesus, the Lord and Savior of humanity and to the glory of God the Father.
*******
Now as we turn to Palm Sunday, we watch the unfolding diorama of the Passion of Jesus.
A donkey. Jerusalem. Cloaks spread on the ground. Palm Branches. Shouts of Hosanna to the King!
The Last Supper. The hymn Jesus sang. The Mount of Olives. The tongue of betrayal.
An ear cut off, then healed.
A back turned to those who struck. A cheek to those who pulled out the beard.
An eye consumed with sorrow.
A mind. Have this mind among you. His mind. The mind of Christ.
Pilate finds no reason to execute Jesus. A tongue that is silent before Herod.
An ear that hears all the abuse. An eye that weeps over Jerusalem.
The crowd: Crucify him. We want Barrabas.
The thorns. The Skull. The Cross. Simon of Cyrene.
Darkness over the land. The temple curtain torn in two.
The disciples standing there:
A tongue. What can they say?
An ear. What do they hear?
An eye. What do they see?
A mind. What are their thoughts?
Jesus, from the cross...”Father forgive them”...His last breath.
Centurion: Certainly this man was innocent.
Jesus the Christ, the Messiah, the Son of God.
*******
You and I are His Memoir.
Surprised? Then what did St Paul mean when he wrote these words in II Corinthians 3:3?
3You show that you are a letter from Christ, the result of our ministry, written not with ink but with the Spirit of the living God, not on tablets of stone but on tablets of human hearts.
Our tongue: What will we therefore choose to speak? Will we know when to be silent?
Our ear: How do we hear the things that life presents, and where does that lead us?
Our eye: Can we bear such a sight...the Beauty of the Lord?
Our mind: Aren’t we somewhere beyond mere thoughts?
Don’t we know with our entire being:
That with our spirit, soul, and body we will follow where He leads.
Lord have mercy.
Amen.