A Sense of Purpose, Rev. Shana Lynngood, Assoc. Minister, All Souls DC Nov. 15, 2009

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Readings

        First reading is from Hebrew scripture. One of the most profound stories of call ever written. Exodus chapter 3 verses 1-6:

        “Moses was keeping the flock of his father-in-law Jethro, the priest of Midian; he led his flock beyond the wilderness, and came to Horeb, the mountain of God. There the angel of the Lord appeared to him in a flame of fire out of a bush; he looked, and the bush was blazing yet it was not consumed. Then Moses said, ‘I must turn aside and look at this great sight, and see why the bush is not burned up.’ When the Lord saw that he had turned aside to see, God called to him out of the bush, ‘Moses, Moses!’ And he said, ‘Here I am.’ Then he said, ‘Come no closer! Remove the sandals from your feet, for the place on which you are standing is holy ground.’ He said further, ‘I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.’ And Moses hid his face, for he was afraid to look at God.”

        The second reading is from Barbara Brown Taylor. This is an excerpt from an essay she wrote in 2001 entitled True Purpose,

        “Right this minute I cannot think of half a dozen people who believe that they are doing exactly what God has called them to do. Instead they are waiting until circumstances improve enough for them to do a better job of fulfilling it. Things will be different once school is over, once there has been time to get more experience, once the right job comes along, once the children are grown and the house is paid off. Until then, one thing is for sure: this is not it—this present life, under these present circumstances—this cannot possibly be what God had in mind…It is the job of the gathered community [of church]---God’s called out ones—who exist, among other things, to remind one another that the lives God is calling us to are the ones we are living right here, right now, under these present circumstances…you have everything you need to respond to your divine call. You have what each o us has: one whole life to live on this earth, with tasks in it that we choose to do well or poorly, and with people in it whom we may lift up by our presence with them or put down by our absence from them, even though we are standing in front of them. Every night when we lie down to sleep, there is either more life in the world because of us or there is less life in the world because of us, and this remains true whether or not we have ever seen a burning bush. Our purpose, for God’s sake, is to increase the abundance of life in this world.”

A Sense of Purpose by Rev. Shana Lynngood, Assoc. Minister, All Souls DC, Nov. 15, 2009.

        One of the things we all want is to feel good about our lives. We want to be proud of the life we are leading and to see ourselves as people of integrity. We want to feel that soul and role, who we are and what we do (not to mention the choices we make) are all in alignment. What makes this challenging and difficult at times is the fact that we are constantly waiting to reach some ideal or perfect state in which we will at last be able to live the life we crave. We seem to feel that life is conspiring against us—the conditions and circumstances of our present life simply won’t allow us to fulfill our call and purpose. It is as if we believe that we (our selves and our lives) are missing some key ingredient necessary to achieve this goal. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying we think we’re living bad lives, it’s just that as Barbara Brown Taylor suggests most of us don’t feel we ‘re leading the life we were meant to.

        What if we were able to shift? What if we did truly believe that we have everything we need to live our best life right now? What if you felt confident you could say, “I am living the life I was meant to.”? What if we could stop waiting for a divine signal or greater sign and trust that we have already arrived. To believe, the revelation that we have already followed many signs and listened closely to the heart’s admonitions in order to make our way to this point. We have already answered a call.

        The most profound revelation we can and should remember time and again is---this is it. This is the life you were called to/ created for. This is (as far as we know) the only life you get. The only choice that remains is will I embrace this life or will I reject it/ belittle its meaning and power. Live the life you have. Not the better one you’ve been holding out for. Not the near idyllic, mistake-free one you think you should be able to live. This one. Right here. Right now. With its triumphs and its failures. With its loves and its losses. Don’t seek something different or more. Rest in the capacity of this life to matter. Not sure which we struggle with most, but sometimes I tend to think its be who you are. We aren’t comfortable in our own skins, unwilling or unable to see our lives as sufficient just as they are. That being someone else—the person we envy, the person more together, the person who isn’t grieving—would not be better. It would just be different and not us.

        My theology—the world needs you to be you, to fully inhabit your life. Only you can fill the role God created you to fill. “Our purpose, for God’s sake, is to increase the abundance of life in this world.”

        We need to honor our lives by taking them seriously, by seeing their value and capacity to make a difference. You are sufficient. Your life as it is is full of potential and possibility and all you need to make whole and full and rich contributions to the world. Too often like Moses we hide our faces from the call of Life. We hope someone else will do what needs to be done. We abdicate our role because the call can’t really be ours to answer. Someone else would do better. If you are not a theist these lessons still apply—what have the events of your life taught you about authenticity, genuine-ness—about what happens when you live from your center rather than your edges? The call of conscience of true self comes again and again—and we ignore it at our own peril.

        One of my favorite spiritual memoir writers ( and I have many of them) is Lauren Winner. She recounts in her book Girl Meets God her wrestling with prayer. In the end she decides that the reason she practices at prayer is because of how it changes her. That even when she feels no “tangible” result she trusts that sediment is being laid. That words of prayer and gratitude will ultimately (she hopes) become the first words on her lips. I think the same is true of heeding our purpose and call. Each time we listen to the still, small voice of conscience or inner truth or God we live more fully into our purpose for being. We feel more acutely the significance and meaning of our lives. We know more directly why we’re here and when we feel most alive, most in touch with who we are—and then can aspire to live from that place more often if not all of the time.

        One of the most challenging aspects of the whole notion of call is that it can’t be avoided nor can it be achieved simply by changing careers or finding love or having kids. All of these things might be part of living out one’s call, but at base, at its very core it goes deeper than that. It is about how well you are doing at being you. It’s about being your most expansive and loving and present you. It is about being in such a way that does nothing less than “increase the abundance of life in the world.” This is no small task. It is to be found here, however, in this life you already have. This achingly beautiful and maddeningly imperfect life that is yours and yours alone. May we each find a way to do our unique part in increasing life.. May we know that we are always on sacred ground. May we trust in the sufficiency and meaning in our unremarkably magnificent lives.