By Grace
“For by grace you have been saved through faith, and this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God— not the result of works, so that no one may boast. For we are what God has made us, God’s work of art, created in Christ Jesus to do the good things, which God prepared for us to do beforehand, from the beginning, to be our way of life.” — Ephesians 2: 8-9.
Friday morning those of us in the theology business woke to news of a change in personnel, a change in staffing— so to speak. Rowan Williams, Archbishop of Canterbury— the position fondly referred to by clerics as ABC— has decided to step down at the end of this year.
The popular press insisted the Archbishop was retiring. He could have, after all, stayed on at least another eight years before a mandatory age limit would catch up with him. Williams would have nothing of that retirement claptrap.
He insisted he’s simply trading one position for another, has decided to do something different, not retire. He will become reacquainted and more involved with academia. He will be a college professor.
Williams is no stranger to that arena. He has two doctorates and was a full professor by the age of 36, very young to achieve that rank in the British education system.
His new post will be Master of Magdalene College, Cambridge. There is no real equivalent to that position in American colleges but, besides teaching, the duties include being responsible for the running of the College and being the chair at meetings of the College Council. So, it is somewhat but not quite like being a college president.
In an interview the Archbishop, a well known theologian and teacher before he took on the duties of leadership for the Anglican Communion, offered a number of justifications for moving on. Among them are the end of this year will mark 10 years in the post of Archbishop and just over 20 as a bishop.
He genuinely feels after 10 years it’s proper to pray and to reflect on and to review options. In doing so he realized there are a number of initiatives he started as Archbishop which will have run their course by year’s end.
Additionally, every 10 years whoever is Archbishop of Canterbury convenes a Lambeth Conference, a gathering of Bishops in the Anglican Communion. The next conference is on the docket is for 2018, the year he would be required to retire. Further, he knows from experience that these conferences take five years to plan. Hence, if he leaves the post now, the person who follows will have five years to prepare.
Having offered a number of reasons for this decision, Williams said the bottom line is not just that he felt it’s time to move on. It’s that if he does so now, he will be acting in a very professional manner. He will be honoring the institution he serves and giving a successor the time to take the reins of the job and be successful. (Slight pause.)
And we hear these words in Ephesians: “For by grace you have been saved through faith, and this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God— not the result of works, so that no one may boast. For we are what God has made us, God’s work of art, created in Christ Jesus to do the good things, which God prepared for us to do beforehand, from the beginning, to be our way of life.” (Slight pause.)
I confess clergy often speak of being called to our profession, to being called to do what we do— in effect being called by God to be pastors... or Archbishops. I have never been particularly comfortable with this terminology. After all, the term is used nearly exclusively for pastors. Therefore, it’s always seemed way too limiting to me.
It is beyond me why, for instance, we cannot say everyone is in some way called. We are called be nurses, bankers, assembly line workers. I believe people are called to all kinds of work.
To be clear, we may not like what we are doing or what we wind up doing. We may feel we need to get out of what we’re doing.
In fact, in cases where we have a low comfort level with a job, my bet is we are not called. And, if we are working at something to which we not called, it’s likely we will do our best to get out of it.
But, to be realistic, it may take time to extricate ourselves from what might be termed for lack of a better phrase ‘simply work’— not something that we feel comfortable doing but something which keeps bread on the table. In short, doing something that is simply work is clearly not a calling but it can be a necessity. And what we do to survive, for most of us, is not who we are, really.
Indeed, the famous composer Richard Rodgers, who wrote some of the most memorable music of the Twentieth Century, said the mistake people most often made when they met him was to confuse who he was as a person with his music, his work. Work is a part of us, but we should never let it define who we are. Work is what we do, not who we are. (Slight pause.)
Of all the things God does for us, the fact that God showers grace upon us is paramount. We, all of us and each of us, possess an abundance of grace, an abundance of God given talents. With the movement back to academia, Archbishop Williams is about to embark on putting a set of talents he had not been fully using back into play.
Indeed, if you think your talents might be underutilized in your current work, the Archbishop would sympathize. Williams expressed some of those frustrations with the position of Archbishop. He sees himself as a teacher and he did not see himself as an administrator or diplomat, the prime talents needed by an Archbishop of Canterbury, although he did have the talent to be an administrator, to be a diplomat. He did these things well.
And, despite having two doctorates, Rowan seems to be a down to earth fellow— have you seen his picture?— all bushy beard and eyebrows about two inches in length— and I suspect the clerical office he filled had way to much pomp and circumstance for him. As a comparison and on a personal note, when people introduce me as the Rev. Joe Connolly, I stop them short and say, “No, no. I’m irreverent Joe Connolly.” (Slight pause.)
Well, all that brings me back to who we are. (Slight pause.) By now, this quote from Marianne Williamson has been repeated so often it’s become cliché. But that does not mean it fails to resonate.
(Quote:) “Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, ‘Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous?’ Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God.”
“Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won’t feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do.”
“We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It’s not just in some of us; it’s in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others” (unquote).
And that, my friends, brings us back to the quote from Ephesians. All the talents we have— and they are a myriad— are gifts from God. We are children of God. We are (to quote Ephesians quite exactly): “God’s... work... of... art...” (Slight pause.)
Today we accepted the all church offering known as One Great Hour of Sharing. That offering, among all those we accept, should be a reminder to us that we are not alone. It should a reminder to us that we are simply one of all God’s children. It should a reminder to us that God showers grace on everyone.
It should a reminder to us that God calls us— there’s that word again– calls us— to seek justice, to work for the freedom of all God’s children. And it should be a reminder to us that God calls us to be one, to live in unity, to live in harmony and to love. (Slight pause.)
Yes, God surrounds us with grace. God surrounds us with love. And God calls each of us to walk in the will of God, to love one another as we remember each of us is a child of God, filled with grace. Amen.
03/18/2012
United Church of Christ, First Congregational, Norwich, New York
ENDPIECE: It is the practice of the Pastor to speak after the Closing Hymn, but before the Choral Response and Benediction. This is an précis of what was said: “To paraphrase what I said earlier: ‘What scares you more— the voice within us that speaks of our shortcomings, or of our true power? And by “true power” I mean our identity beyond mere egotism— power which comes from God.’”
BENEDICTION: There is but one message in Scripture: God loves us. Let us endeavor to let God’s love shine forth in our lives. For with God’s love and goodness, there is power to redeem, power to revive, power to renew, power to resurrect. So, may the love of God the Creator which is real, the Peace of Christ which surpasses all understanding and companionship of the Holy Spirit, ever present, keep our hearts and minds in God’s knowledge and care this day and forever more. Amen.
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