Never Alone

Acts 17: 22-31; John 14: 15-21

FPC; 4-27-08

          One late afternoon last August, after being away for several days, Alice, the children and I pulled into the driveway at home and were greeted by a surprise.  In the yard between Granville Street and the carport, there were eight little kittens, less than a month old.  Some had their noses to the ground, searching for food I guess.  Others were lying in the grass, weary from the changes their young lives had already experienced.  All of them were thin. Someone had dropped them off at the house and left them there. 

          After Jesus announces his departure, the disciples fear the experience of those little kittens, the fear of being alone, of being abandoned, of not surviving without Jesus by their side. 

          Jesus had been their companion, the one who taught them how to speak and live.  Now that the time of Jesus’ death has almost arrived, Jesus gives the disciples a promise: “I will not leave you orphaned.” The task of teaching and guiding will be given to the Holy Spirit. The disciples will continue to experience Jesus’ presence through the one that will be sent to be with them: the Parakletos a Greek word meaning Spirit that also can be translated with any one of these English words: Comforter, Counselor, Helper, or, as the NRSV prefers, Advocate. 

          We assumed each of those roles for those eight abandoned kittens. We made sure they kept a safe distance from the road.  We fed them.  We gave them something to drink.  We talked to them.  We nourished them.  We reminded them that they were not alone. 

          Never alone.  When I think of Parakletos as Advocate, I think of Guardian ad Litems, caring and qualified adults appointed to stand by children who are abused, abandoned or neglected. They provide a voice for children; they are advocates for some of our society’s most vulnerable people, making sure they are not lost in society.

          When I think of Parakletos as Advocate, I think of defense attorneys, providing a voice for the accused, presenting that person’s case to a judge or jury. 

          The Spirit acts as our voice, our Advocate with God.  But, if I understand the text, the Spirit also acts as God’s Advocate with us. 

          Some of you may be old enough to recognize the name Jimmy Reed.  Reed was one of the great blues masters of the fifties.  The son of a sharecropper, he brought the rhythm and blues sound of the Mississippi Delta into popular rock and roll mainstream.  I imagine many high school boys used to pick up their cheap electric guitars and try to mimic the voice and the sound of Jimmy Reed. 

          According to the great preacher Tom Long, who was a fan of Jimmy Reed’s music, if you listen carefully to one of Reed’s songs, you can hear in the background a soft woman’s voice murmuring in advance the song’s next verse.  Legend has it that Jimmy Reed became so engrossed in the rhythm and blues beat that he simply could not remember the words of his own songs.  He needed help with the lyrics; the woman’s voice was that of his wife, devotedly coaching her husband by whispering the lyrics in his ear as he sang.[1]        

           Sometimes we forget the song that our lives are supposed to be singing.  So, Jesus promises the presence of the Advocate, the spirit of truth, who will bring back to our minds the lyrics the Lord would have us sing.  What are the lyrics the Spirit whispers to us? 

          The Spirit seeks to correct our amnesia by whispering into our ears the importance of being obedient; of following the instructions God has given us.

          I like Michael Lindvall’s analogy in which he compares us to a child who has just opened his main gift on Christmas morning.  Imagine, if you would, that the gift is some complicated mechanical or electrical toy in a box that notes, “Some assembly required”.    The child bursts with excitement and rips the toy out of its molded Styrofoam packing.  The boy’s Mom says, “Slow down, son, let’s sit down and read the directions together.  I’ll show you how it works.”  But the child responds, “I want to do it all by myself,”; and then he trots off behind the couch, leaving the directions lying in Dad’s lap.  In twenty minutes or so, the child is back, angry and frustrated, on the edge of tears.  The stupid thing doesn’t work.  Nothing fits together right.  On of the pieces is already busted.

          According to Lindvall, life is one complicated main gift.  Some assembly indeed is required.  Our first thought is to put it together alone, to make it work all by ourselves.  We may seem to get it together for a while, but then something goes awry.  Nothing fits together right.  One piece is already broken.  Then maybe, just maybe, we remember that our lives came with directions.  The Spirit, God’s advocate, reminds us to be obedient, not to be so independent that we fail to follow the instructions God has given us.  The lyrics the Spirits whispers into our ears are the sweet refrains of his commandments, God’s gift to God’s people.[2]

       At the front and back of this passage from John, we find Jesus’ commandment to love.  Elsewhere, the command is lauded as the greatest command which makes it the most important part of God’s instructions for our lives.  As the great preacher Bill Coffin once said, “If we fail in love, we fail in all things else.”[3]

       In one of her books, Anne Lamott has written a chapter in which she refers to a the church that did not fail in showing love for her.  The chapter is entitled: “Why I Make Sam Go to Church”.  Sam is her son.  This is what she writes. 

       “When I was at the end of my rope, the people at St. Andrew tied a knot in it for me and helped me hold on.   The church became my home in the old meaning of home-that its where, when you show up, they have to let you in.  They let me in.  They even said, “You come back now.” 

       Lamotte then affectionately remembers how Sam was welcomed and prayed for at St. Andrew seven months before he was born.  After Anne announced she was pregnant “they set about providing for us.  They brought clothes, they brought me casseroles to keep in the freezer, and they brought me assurance that this baby was going to be a part of the family.  And they began slipping me money.”

       “Now a number of the older black women live pretty close to the bone financially on small Social Security checks.  But routinely they sidled up to me and stuffed bills in my pocket-tens and twenties.  One of the most consistent donors was a very old woman named Mary Williams, who is in her eighties now, so beautiful with her crushed hats and hallelujahs; she always brought me plastic baggies full of dimes, noosed with little wire twists.”

       “I was usually filled with a sense of something like shame until I’d remember that wonderful line of Blake’s-that we are here to learn to endure the beams of love-and I would take a long deep breath and force these words out of my strangulated throat: ‘Thank you.’”[4]

       Poet Raymond Carver once wrote:

          “And did you get what

          You wanted from this life even so?

          I did.

          And what did you want?

          To call myself beloved, to feel myself

          Beloved on earth.”[5]

       The Paracletos is God’s advocate in our lives, whispering the lyrics in our ears, reminding us to follow the instructions God has given us to love one another.  When we follow those instructions, there will be fewer people who have a fear of being abandoned, of being left desolate.  When we listen to the lyrics and shine beams of love on others, people around us will feel beloved on earth.   And, God’s kingdom will have come a little bit closer.  All praise and thanks be to God.