STREAMS, RIVERS & THE GREAT OCEAN
Noreen Kimball & James Ishmael Ford
17 April 2005

James—Anyone who is involved in a spiritual community knows that it takes three “T’s” to flourish: time, talent & treasure. Today we try to acknowledge those who give their time and talent to make this spiritual community what it is. What it is is an oasis in turbulent times, a place of succor, a place of healing, a place for transformation. We want to acknowledge all those who have given of themselves so we can be this special place of hope and possibility.
This is a little difficult. In a community like ours the gift of time and talent is so freely given by so many we can’t actually name everyone. After thinking about the scope of what happens here we’ve come up with a way to acknowledge most of what goes on here. As Noreen and I name these tasks, we hope you’ll stand.

J. Will anyone who has taught or helped in the Lifespan religious education program this year, please stand? (and, please, stay standing)
N. Will anyone who chairs a committee in this congregation this year, please stand? (and, please, stay standing)
J. Will anyone who serves on a committee in this congregation this year, please stand?
N. Will anyone who sings in the Choir this year, please stand?
J. Will anyone who participated in running a worship service for this congregation this year, please stand?
N. Will anyone who serves on the Board of Trustees in this congregation this year, please stand?
J. Will anyone who participated in running the Holiday Fair or selling the Holiday Trees this year, please stand?
N. Will anyone who participated in running the Services Auction this year please stand?
J. Will anyone who participated in running the Sandy Island Weekend or will be participating in the running the Ferry Beach Weekend this year, please stand?
N. Will anyone who participated in running the Capital Campaign this year, please stand?
J. Will anyone who participated in planning and executing the Women’s Alliance programs and brunches this year, please stand?
N. Will anyone who participated in running the Community Breakfasts this year, please stand?
J. Will anyone who has participated in running the every-member canvass and the Fellowship Dinner this year, please stand?
N. Will anyone who has responded to calls to repair the office computers or software; the Society’s sound system, or supervised roofing or building work in any way please stand?
J. If you are a lay minister, or a member of the care crew who has been active this year, will you please stand?
N. Would anyone who has been active in our social justice council, or has participated this year in any one of our social justice projects such as visiting a prisoner, picking up donations, volunteering with the UU Urban ministry or the UU Service Committee, working on Habitat, or participating in the Zambia project please stand up?
J. Who have we forgotten? Whatever the activity you’ve joined in, please stand up.


N. To paraphrase Wendell Berry in his Poem of Thanks, “Through you we rise, and you through us, into the joy we make…”

J. You are the people who wove together the First Unitarian Society in Newton this year. You have our admiration, our gratitude, and our love. Please be seated. (Noreen & James clap)

James
A few years ago UU minister Fred Small wrote a sermon where he declared, “Service is an instinct, but it is also a practice.” Noreen and I were really taken with that sermon, and particularly with that line. First, a thought about “practice.” I love that term “practice” as it both means preparing and doing. Things do happen randomly, wildflowers burst by the roadside. And they’re glorious. But when we give something our attention, when we add the human dimension of cultivation, then the possibilities are magnified. Where tens and twenties may have been fed, now tens of millions may eat. To have an intentional practice is to open gates of possibility beyond our wildest dreams. To engage a spiritual practice is to open the gate of hope for ourselves and for the whole world.

Now that next term “service.” To work on behalf of another is an ancient thing; it is maybe, the most human of things. I suggest our core practice, our core spiritual practice as Unitarian Universalists may well be service: if not the core, certainly right there very near the heart of what we’re about.

In his sermon Fred made six suggestions about how to deepen the spiritual practice of service. Noreen and I really liked them and have made those suggestions our own this morning. In this worship service about service, with what you may have noticed is its musical theme of water; we are bringing you what we think of as six major tributaries of the river of service, the River that takes us to the great ocean itself.

Noreen
I’m crazy about this kind of thing. Nothing makes me feel more secure than a list of how to do something. If you can write it out, attach numbers to it—you’re going to make me happy. In a world that is virtually unfathomable in its complexity, the numbered list of instructions has more allure than… chocolate. And the notion that there would be such a list, an inventory of rules for embarking on the path of service was particularly interesting to me. Because, frankly, I’d have thought that if there was ever anything that seemed purely instinctive, it’d be the desire to serve.

But, it turns out, that if you choose the path of service, it would be a really fine idea for you to look at what James and I consider some really first class advice not only for how to do a good job, but also how to find the most satisfaction in doing it. So. Rule number one, the first tributary. It is very important to have fun. Please don’t underestimate the seriousness of this advice. It’s critical to the success of having service as your spiritual practice. If you doubt that, remember that Hebrew scripture advises us to make a JOYFUL noise before the Lord. And the New Testament assures us that the Lord loves a CHEERFUL giver. And if those sources don’t impress you, just remember that even a good old atheist do-gooder like Emma Goldman said, “If I can’t dance, I don’t want to be part of your revolution.”

A long time ago, when a bunch of us volunteers were considering doing a survey for some important reason I can no longer remember, we went to Allan Hartman to ask him to help us. After all, in his job, he did quite a lot of surveying and we figured he’d be a good member of the team. He turned us down flat. And, serious do-gooder that I was, I found his reason really shocking. “I do that stuff all day to make a living,” he said. “If you want to put me to work, give me something to do that I’ll enjoy. Put me in charge of making pancakes.”

Many years of watching volunteers later, I have learned the wisdom of Allan’s approach. If it gives you pleasure to use skills you use every day, then great. Do that. But if you would find it more fun to make pancakes or decorate the chancel—something that takes you out of your every day routine, by all means do that. And don’t let anyone, even me, ever guilt you into doing otherwise. Fred Small says, “Feed the hungry, but feed as well your own hungry heart.” Then everyone will be fed.

James
Our second tributary is “don’t be afraid to start small.” Or, for that matter, to stay with the small. I’m much taken with the account of the mustard seed in the Gospel according to Mark, where that smallest of all things, the mustard seed, when tended carefully, grows to become a great bush, shelter for the birds of heaven. The other gospels, as I’ve mentioned on occasion from this pulpit also cite this saying. But they muck it up; they have that mustard seed, the smallest of all things, grow into trees. You don’t have to be a master gardener to know mustard isn’t a tree. This reflects a human tendency to miss the real for some idea of what should be. This smallest of all things grows into something else small. But, and while it is easy to miss, the truth is that small is enough.

In our culture where bigger is better, we often miss this point. Even those here, we who like to think we’re above the fray, not caught in the machinations of advertising – we tend to want it big. As a minister, while I’m sure no one here has ever noticed, I have to admit, being a bit on the competitive side – I want to serve a big church. Until, that is, a colleague who serves a really big church over the last few years described to me the dissention and unhappiness he constantly experienced and now this year he’s been recounting his painful negotiated resignation (which is minister-eze for firing). Despite myself and my American inclination for the big, I realize what I really want, what I really need, is something much smaller – a happy community, devoted, and caring. A happy community, devoted and caring: three very small things. And oh so important.

I should know this lesson. When I was younger I was much taken with the Chinese oracle the I Ching. The ninth hexagram is titled the “Taming Power of the Small.” And the sixty-second is “Preponderance of the Small.” The significance of the small is a recurring theme in the Taoist tradition. As I studied this old book I found myself constantly returning to these hexagrams and reflecting on their possible meanings in my life. This exercise can be valuable for all of us.

In Taoism, that which is small seems weak, but in fact has incredible transformative power. Like water. Here we find harmony with what is, balance, the middle way as a perspective that allows genuine healing, and so importantly: authentic human-scale transformation. It is a hint for us as we seek lives of service.
The saving power of the small: the wise do not disdain the small. Don’t fall into the false dichotomy this is just Band-Aids, I’m saving myself for the big thing. You may find yourself waiting a very long time, missing the real for some dream of the real. Attending to the small, to the present, in our attention to each other, to the various tasks at hand, we find everything - everything.

Of course one never knows where any enterprise will take you. Things certainly are hopping around here. Big actually seems to be growing out of our attention to the small. These days FUSN is getting to be a pretty big bush, no doubt. In all this, in all that is going on, we just need to remember the call us to cultivate the mustard seed – to see ourselves as the mustard seed - and to attend to the small things. In this attention to the smallest things we really can discover ourselves transformed, we can find a happy community, devotion and caring. In doing this we, you and I, do become that wondrous bush beneath which the birds of heaven take their rest.


Noreen
Third, be patient. This is my personal favorite. I have my mother’s temper. It has not served me well. I have worked on the virtue of patience for a very long time and it’s really only in the last few years that I have had some success. A few incidents have helped encourage me to do that work. Coming into an office where a few of the younger people in my department were imitating me without knowing I was present taught me a lot. One of them had pulled her eyeglasses down on her nose and, peering fiercely through them was saying to the others, “You told the client What????”

Noticing that one of my sons had developed the habit of raising his hands automatically to signal that I should calm down before he had even embarked on what he was going to tell me, was another impetus for me to try and work on the virtue of patience—at least when it came to overreacting. I can tell you that in my opinion, the acquisition of patience will make a greater difference in your life than any other virtue you could acquire. If you are patient, you will learn more. You will be less likely to die in traffic. Your older children may actually consider confiding in you. Your spouse or your lover will feel more supported. Your friends will be easier in your company. You will find your computer much less exasperating. And especially pleasing, a regular demonstration of your patience will frustrate your enemies no end.

At this moment you may be asking yourself, what has patience to do with service? Well, setting out on the path of service, beginning to work for a good cause, is like setting out to plant a Japanese garden. You simply have to know in your heart that what you are engaged in is creating great beauty. Though you may never get to see the garden in its full glory, the work must be begun if it is to bear fruit. After all, Goethe said, “Whatever you can do or dream you can, begin it. Boldness has genius, power, and magic in it.” He did not say, “Whatever you can finish, begin it.” The genius is in the beginning, the setting out.

It is so easy to get discouraged when we look at the world; it is so easy to be cowed by the huge gap between the way things are and they way they should be. But this is where our Unitarian Universalist faith comes in. This is the stuff of our sixth principle. Remember? “We covenant to affirm and promote: The goal of world community with peace, liberty, and justice for all?” Believing in that as a genuine possibility is part of what religious faith is about for a Unitarian Universalist.

If people didn’t have the patience to begin good works they would never see to fruition, we would never have seen an end to slavery. We would never have achieved the vote for women, or, for that matter, we would never have known human flight.

James
Fourth, don’t get attached to results. Someone really smart once told me the perfect is the enemy of the good. Something perfect, is complete, without fault or blemish. It cannot be improved upon. Now there is a spiritual sense in which everything is perfect just as it is. I’m not going there today.

The common sense of our ordinary lives is that there is hurt and there is healing. How we choose to engage life determines whether we’re the servants of hurt or healing. If we find ourselves loving the “people” but not wanting to actually deal with individuals, we’re on the wrong track.

If we think our task is solve all the problems, all the hurts of the world – we are only going to be frustrated. Returning to Taoism, there’s that famous story from the ancient writer Chuang-tzu. We’ve all heard it, I’m sure. The farmer’s horse runs away. His neighbors commiserate with the farmer’s bad fortune. But he responds, “Maybe.” A few days later the horse returns with a band of wild horses. His neighbors commend his good fortune and new found wealth. He responds, “Maybe.” Then the farmer’s son is thrown from one of the wild horses, and breaks his leg in three places. Once again to his neighbor’s commiserations, he replies, “Maybe.” Then the army marches through the village and drafts all the young men, except the farmer’s son. The story ends there. Of course, we still should add “maybe.”

In this world of complexity, you just can’t know how it’ll turn out. But like paying attention to the small rather than the large, we may find what is really important isn’t so much what we think of as the goal. As you all know after years of sharing some important social justice projects with our neighbors at Myrtle Baptist, we’re becoming even more involved in various projects. Friday evening we had a joint dinner together. On May 19th, we’re sponsoring a joint conversation on race. I hear the mayor is coming.

But in the planning for these things, I’ve found myself following the lead of the Reverend Howard Haywood – who seems to have a motto – keep it simple. When people have suggested big plans, he keeps pulling the conversation back to helping us find ways just to be together. He thinks he’s a Baptist, and I’m sure he is. But increasingly I’m coming to think of Reverend Haywood as a Taoist sage. He keeps us to the small. He isn’t particularly interested in accomplishing big things. And he isn’t attached to results.

He sees the saving power of presence, of doing, of being. I want to transform the world. I think Howard already has.

Noreen
Fifth, dedicate daily activity to the spirit of service. When I was a child, there was a phrase with which I was very familiar. That phrase was, “offer it up.” What was meant by that was simply that if you were engaged in work that benefited others, or that served the good of the family or the community, no matter how small or menial the task, it could be transformed into a prayer for the honor and glory of God. All you had to do was offer your work up to God with that intention. Now, the details of that transaction may not please you, but there is much to be learned from it if you take a moment to remember that any activity can be transformed by how you hold it in your mind and heart.

There are people here I know that I can always count on to say yes when I need someone to fold up the tables and put them away. Or to troll around the room with a trash bag after a big dinner. Or, to roll up their sleeves and volunteer to clear out the whole parish hall after the Fair. And I can tell you, it is not because these people are in love with mindless physical labor. Sometimes, of course, that kind of task can be really fulfilling as a change from a desk job. But I think that what sets these people apart from those of us who would rather chew glass than volunteer to clean up after someone else, is that they have managed to transform a menial task to something much larger and lovelier. Parents and lovers know all about this. For the people I’m talking about here at FUSN, however, these chores become essential services that make this community work. And so, they are joyful about it, they get a kick out of doing it, and it’s really fun to work with them. It is amazing to watch people who have transformed what might have been done in a spirit of resentment, into work that is done in a spirit of love and service.

James
Sixth, understand the path of service as a path of awakening. When I was in seminary I had the enormous good fortune to study with the renowned Buddhist scholar Masao Abe, who for two years was visiting from Japan. One of his many contributions to comparative religious thought was the observation there tends to be two kinds of religion: that rooted in revelation and that rooted in awakening.

As children of the west we’re vastly more familiar with the former: where faith takes its shape from the mouths of prophets who themselves assert they are speaking the word of the divine. At least in theory faith becomes a take it or leave it proposition. Of course human beings enter the fray and eventually it becomes a conversation. But, here I want to focus on that later term: religion of awakening, and what it might mean here. Such faiths are predicated in the proposition that human beings contain everything they need to find joy and peace and possibility.

We are not damaged goods. We are not lacking. We only have gotten confused, fallen into a sleep, and need only to awaken. The awakened state is actually our natural state. Revelatory religions tend to dominate in the west; religions of awakening tend to dominate in the east. What is intriguing for our purposes is how while we Unitarian Universalists are deeply rooted in the west, our parents are Christianity and Judaism; nonetheless we’ve become a faith of awakening.

The way we value the mind, that particular image of the interdependent web which fires so many imaginations and hints at a path of justice predicated on our family resemblance; are tokens of a faith in awakening. Those who stand in this family of religious traditions note there are different ways to wake up. Some practice meditation. Others study. And we do.

Now I really believe the heart of it is best found in balance. That acknowledged, our core way, the touchstone of our spiritual community is engagement. When we serve, whether it be one another or in reaching out across the globe to help all those children in Zambia, we are manifesting our path of awakening. We are, I believe, at that moment, awakening not only ourselves, but the world.

Here we find the tributaries that helped us to the river have now flowed into the great ocean itself. Here we discover the way truly is about joy, about possibility, about hope. What we are doing is that amazing. So, thank you. Thank you.

And, amen.