Think About These Things. Really.

Jeremiah 1:4-9
Psalm 84
Philippians 4:4-9
Matt. 9:35-38

And so, deacons and priests in waiting, the day has come. The day you dreamed of, worked hard for, maybe ran even harder from; the day you worried about and rejoiced in. In a few Spirit-filled minutes you will take vows that nobody can possibly fulfill but for the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ. Our bishop will lay his hands upon you and affirm the calling your communities have already discerned in you. You will be vested, you will share in the celebration of the Eucharistic feast, you will go out to love and serve the Lord as priests and deacons even though you have no idea what that means. And let me say for the record: if think you know what that means, prepare yourself for surprise. Which is God’s stock in trade

Trust me on this one, because I speak with the authority of 364 surprising days of priesthood. Tomorrow it will be a year since I stood where you are standing. As you might imagine, the privilege of preaching on this occasion brought me back a flood of not-so-distant memories from my own ordination. And what I found myself thinking about was the totally surprising moment, right after my presenters had put on my stole and chasuble, when one of my fellow ordinands turned to me—eyes brimming with emotion—and said “you are so beautiful.”  So let me pay it forward. Ordinands, you are beautiful. Presenters and church friends, you are beautiful. Families, you are beautiful. People who wandered in off the street expecting to visit a quiet museum of a Cathedral, well… you might be disappointed, but you are still so very beautiful.

To say “you are beautiful” carries baggage in our image-conscious culture. But at that moment on June 14, 2014, I knew without a doubt that Kirsten was not commenting on my appearance. Although my vestments were pretty wonderful! She was simply telling God’s truth, which is as true for me as it was for her and is for you. We are beautiful. We are baptized, we are bishops, we are deacons we are priests… all of us utterly beautiful in God’s eyes. And this is a day for recognizing the truth of who and what we are.

And let me remind you, beloveds—echoing our brother Paul—that we really need to be thinking about whatever is true. Also about whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is pleasing, and whatever is commendable. If there is any excellence and if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things.

Today’s lessons exhort us to do a lot of things. To speak the word of the Lord, to rejoice, and to proclaim the good news of the kingdom and cure every disease and every sickness, after the pattern of Jesus’ ministry. Although these are lessons frequently chosen for ordinations in the Episcopal Church, I want to remind us that proclamation, rejoicing and service are the birthright and the responsibility of all baptized Christians.  In addition, our ordinands take vows to interpret the world to the church, declare forgiveness, bless, and administer sacraments; ministries which are intended to enhance but not replace the ministry we are all called to.

I pray that the doing of all these things brings us all—lay and ordained alike—great joy. But for the new ordinands especially, I pray that your ministries be cause for rejoicing even when they don’t bring you comfort or safety or the parochial call you most want. And when you are surprised because things don’t go the way you want or expect—which will happen—know that you are in good biblical company. Jeremiah certainly knew how profoundly disruptive the Lord’s call can be; Matthew knew that good news was not always received as such, and Paul of all people knew that rejoicing can be a countercultural business.

Consider the context of the letter to the Philippians. Paul was in prison with no certainty he would be released alive, but such was his love for the church that he was still mediating disputes and dispensing pastoral advice from his cell. So as I pondered this lesson I found myself surprised that Paul’s advice to the church in Philippi was not just to do something about what was wrong, but also to think about what was right. “If there is any excellence and if there is anything worthy of praise,” he wrote, “think about these things.

It matters what we think about. As Henry David Thoreau observed,  “To make a deep mental path, we must think over and over the kind of thoughts we wish to dominate our lives.”  Everyone from poets to neurologists to organizational development theorists tell us this: that what we focus on becomes our reality. Which means that in order to be true, honorable and just leaders for an excellent church, we need to cultivate habits of thinking about excellent things.

So what might be some habits of mind for an excellent church? Well, let us pause for a moment to think about these things. We can, for example, assume good intentions on the part of our fellow lay and ordained ministers, so that working together becomes second nature for us. Collaboration. Think about this thing.

We can choose to focus our attention on what God is already doing outside our church doors, so that being fully present in our neighborhoods is the natural way we embody Christ.
Embeddedness, as our bishop calls it. Think about this thing.

We can allow ourselves to feel the absence of the people with whom we aren’t yet in fellowship, so that seeking out the perspective of the other becomes the obvious path to our healing. Diversity. Think about this thing.

We can long so deeply for relationship with all whom Jesus called friends that it overcomes our cultural fear of what might be called evangelism. Invitation. Think about this thing.

Collaboration, embeddedness, diversity, invitation: these are, of course, the vitality practices that our bishop calls us to. Which puts us in the good company of virtue ethicists from Aristotle to Aquinas to Stanley Hauerwas, who teach us that our habits of mind shape our behaviors, which in turn shape our shared reality. According to Hauerwas, habits of mind are crucial for our ability to remember truth—in the sense of God’s truth—so that we may speak truth. Virtuous habits of mind actually transform the speech of leaders such that we do not disempower those who are led. Leadership, Hauerwas says, is really a form of hospitality.

Ordinands, cultivate habits of mind that are excellent, truthful and hospitable. Remind us to be a rejoicing people even in the midst of challenge, as Paul himself modeled and taught, because joy is not so much an emotion dependent on circumstances as a discipline of perception. Above all, stay faithful to the discipline of perceiving God’s intimate and abiding love for us. The Lord is near, as Paul proclaimed: that is the singular source of our joy. And in our faithful response to God’s call, we are the Lord’s joy too. And I’m thinking, well… there’s nothing more beautiful than that.