A Sermon delivered by Reverend Marlin Lavanhar, Senior Minister
At All Souls Unitarian Church in Tulsa, OK
Sunday, Feb. 18, 2007
Bob wanted to live deliberately. He wanted to know life more intimately. Bob had come to see that his aims in life were
to be happy, to find fulfillment and to leave something behind that would make
the world a better place. He often wondered
if there was a way to structure his life to help him achieve his goals. He was interested in finding a method or a
practice or some framework for his life.
One day he was talking to his friend Sara and she
told him about a wise woman who lived at the edge of town. Sara explained that this woman was a bit eccentric,
but Sara grew up around her and thought she could surely answer his question. The idea of seeking-out “a wise woman at the
edge of town” seemed a bit strange to Bob, but he decided he’d give it a try. He went to the address that Sara had given
him and knocked on the door. An elderly
woman opened the door and Bob explained that he had a question he hoped she
could answer. And as the story goes, right
there in the doorway, they had this conversation.
Bob said, “I’m looking for some basic steps to help
me live a life of meaning and purpose and joy.
I want my life to have an impact.
I want to feel I’m living well and being effective. Sometimes I just feel like I’m going through
my life and it’s living me instead of the other way around. I want to know I’m approaching my life deliberately,
in a way that is making the most of my gifts and opportunities. Do you know a way for a person to do this?”
The wise woman looked back at him and after a long
pause she said, “yes, it’s.” and suddenly she fell silent as if she were struck
dumb. Bob started wondering what was
going on.
He
could hardly stand the anticipation. He
waited and looked at her for as long as he could and then said,
“Iiiiiiiiiiiiit’s?” “Yes, it’s.” the
woman said again and fell silent again. Bob
thought he’d try to coax it out of her. “Iiiiiiiiit’s…?” he said and the woman repeated,
“Yes, it’s.” “It’s what!?” said Bob, finally
starting to lose his patience. “It’s”
the old woman said again, and shut the door.
As you can imagine, Bob was confounded by this
exchange. He walked back to his car mumbling
“It’s, it’s, it’s, it’s… the woman’s lost her mind” he thought to himself. The next day when he saw Sara, he told her
what had happened and how the woman kept saying “It’s” and then not finishing
the sentence. Sara laughed because she
knew what the wise woman meant. Sara
explained that “ITS” is an acronym I.T.S. which stands for: Invite, Transform and
Serve.
I begin this morning with this story to introduce a
way of approaching life with intention and purpose. ITS. I
– T – S. Invite, Transform and Serve. The first step is to INVITE. Inviting something we want or need into our
lives is about asking for, and being open to, new possibilities. I’m reminded of my friend Bill’s story from
seminary.
One day Bill was feeling depressed. It seemed like nothing was going his way, and
it had been like this for a while. He
was living in Provincetown,
Massachusetts and he went to take
a walk on the beach. The sun had just
set and there were only a few people scattered along the shore. As Bill began approaching he heard a man
yelling, “Blessings. Blessings! Come Blessings, Come! Blessings!” And Bill thought to himself, “Now here’s a guy
who knows how to ask for blessings.” Bill
had never thought about coming outside and yelling for what he really needed. Right there and then, Bill decided he was
going to start asking God (and the universe) for the things he needed. It was a profound moment of revelation.
This is a true story, and I love it, because a few
seconds later he looked back over at the man who was yelling for blessings and
a dog ran up to him and he said, “Blessings, there you are! Where have you been?”
Nevertheless, regardless of what the man was yelling
for, Bill realized that night that he needed to start asking for what he
needed. And that’s what it means to
invite. If we want more love, we first
need to invite love into our lives. It’s
about being clear about what it is we want and need, and then being open to
it. If we want a deliberate relationship
with God or the sacred in life, we need to invite God or the sacred into our
daily lives through prayer and devotion.
If we want healing, then opening ourselves to healing is the first step. Even if we want a better job, it begins by getting
clear with ourselves: “I want a better job.”
However, invitation in this way is not just about
saying the words or yelling them into the sky.
But speaking or writing our goals and a vision for our lives is an
important first step toward living deliberately. It’s the beginning of focusing our attention
on what’s most important to us and it’s the first step in making a commitment
to change. Yet, it takes more than words
or a commitment. Inviting God or
spirituality into our lives, for example, means making time each day to connect
with God and that which is most sacred to you.
Just like inviting health into our lives means taking time to exercise
each day.
The same is true of our relationships. If we want to invite greater love and
friendship into our lives, it can help to take a moment at the beginning of each
day to reflect upon how we want to relate to the people we meet. Do you ever do that? Do you ever stop and think, “I want to live
this day with gratitude and have compassion for the people I meet?” It’s incredible what can happen when we live
that deliberately.
ITS begins with invitation, and goes on to T for transformation. Once we invite something into our lives we
begin to notice changes or transformation.
When we invite and open ourselves to healthy living, we begin to transform
our relationship to food and our bodies.
If we make it a lifestyle we even see our bodies begin to transform the
way they look and feel and the amount of energy we have. When we invite God and spirituality we begin
to transform our morning routines or our bed-time rituals or our Sunday mornings
to make room. Once we invite love and
closer relationships into our lives, we begin to see our relationships being
transformed. And this happens, in part,
because our perspective on our relationships begins changing.
Author Rachel Naomi Remen tells a story about a
surgeon she once worked with who had become burnt-out with his work and quite depressed.[i] He was one of the top oncology surgeons in
the country, but his work had lost meaning for him. With her prompting, the surgeon started to
pay more attention to what moved, touched and inspired him each day. In essence, the surgeon began to invite a new
perspective into his life. He began to
invite inspiration back into his work.
He started
keeping a journal of what touched, moved and inspired him each day.
At first his journal entries were about things like seeing
new treatments start working and people’s white blood cell counts change
significantly. But eventually he began
to key-in to things like patients struggling through incredible pain and
obstacles holding on by a thread of love.
He found
himself being moved by the way people were “willing to sacrifice parts of their
bodies to affirm the value of being alive.”
As he began to see things differently, his attitude
changed, and so did the attitudes of the people around him. One day he came in on a woman who was going
through an intense protocol of chemo therapy, and she was bouncing her 4-year-old
daughter on her knee and laughing with her teenage daughter. He was overcome by the resilience of this
mother and her love for her children. Totally
uncharacteristic of him, he told her how moved he was when he came in and saw
her with her children. He told her that
he noticed her incredible love and her will to live and he said that that power
could possibly heal her someday. The
woman smiled and thanked him and told him how much that meant to her.
After that he found himself starting to talk to many
of his patients about what sustained them during their illness. His patients started sending him cards and
gifts, which had never happened before. One
even gave him a stethoscope with his name engraved on it. And it was that gift that helped him realize what
made his work meaningful. It was not
only saving people’s lives, but listening to people’s hearts. And it all began with an invitation to gain a
new perspective on his life’s work. The
invitation was the beginning of a major transformation that opened his heart and
expanded his world.
Invite, transform and serve. The last part involves service. Time and time again we hear that people who
orient their lives in significant ways around being of service to others claim
to find greater fulfillment and satisfaction in life. When I’m visiting with people at the end of
their lives, many times the stories they share most passionately have to do
with times when they helped someone else.
When they cared deeply and found a way to respond, even at great risk
sometimes. The reason these stories come
to have great magnitude at the end of people’s lives is because, as Albert Pine
said, “What we’ve done for ourselves alone, dies with us. What we’ve done for others and the world
remains and is immortal.”
How many people would agree that when you’ve served
others, and have helped others in need, that you felt a deep sense of
satisfaction? How many people have had
that experience?
Almost
every hand is up. When we serve others
we allow ourselves to touch and be touched by another person. Service connects us to one another. Service is a kind of belonging. So when we serve this church community, for
example, we know we belong. When we
serve another person, we know we are valued and they know they are valued. Service demonstrates our interconnectedness
and our worth. This is what it means to
be a blessing.
Service, however, must be driven from a deep
connection to our values. Otherwise it
leads to burn-out and can be patronizing.
That’s why service alone is not enough.
That’s why ITS begins with the invitation to our highest values and to
healthy living and the transformations of our lives that comes from that
invitation. These become the fertile
soil from which true service grows.
Invite. Transform. Serve.
It’s a simple way of staying connected to what’s most essential in life.
(Not to be confused with the more
popular approach to finding fulfillment in our culture: Indulge, conform and
spend!) It’s a way to make sure that we’re
living the life we want to live instead of our lives living us.
Invite, transform and serve. It’s not just a personal way of living with meaning
and purpose. It’s also a way for us to live
our purpose as a church. Invitation is
as important to keeping a church community healthy and focused as it is to keeping
individuals healthy and focused. One of
our roles is to make sure we are welcoming and inviting to visitors and guests.
It’s also important to the life and future of the
church to offer invitations to others who we think might find something of
value here. How many people came here
the first time having been invited by someone else? It’s great to be invited and let in on
something special and unique.
It’s
like being told of a great new restaurant, except in this case, it can change
your life.
I know it may sound like I’m trying to get you to be
evangelical. That word leaves a bad
taste in many people’s mouths. But the
word evangelical actually means, “sharing the good news.” It’s important for us to share the good news
of this church! Not in obnoxious ways,
like the woman who witnessed to me in Wild Oats the other day. Bless her heart! But in ways like we already do. Inviting
people who we think will find meaning and value here.
Another kind of hospitality and invitation in the
life of the church involves inviting people within the church. Invite them to join a branches group, or a
men’s group, or a class you’re taking, or an event that’s happening, or a
service project you’re involved in. I
think we sometimes hesitate to invite people because we don’t want to put
pressure on them, when in fact, it’s a compliment to be asked to participate. It’s about letting people know they are
welcome and wanted and that they belong.
And, just like with individuals, invitation leads to transformation.
As
we invite new people they help transform this community. They bring new voices to our choirs and our
hymn singing. They help create new programs, new ministries, and bring new
ideas.
As we invite people with various different cultural
and ethnic backgrounds, their participation transforms the way we are as a
church. I’ve loved how over the past few
years Luis and Jen Rojas have started ushering on Cinco de Mayo in their
sombreros. And how ever since
establishing our relationship with our partner church in Transylvania
we’ve had Hungarian dinners with spicy goulash, and have started singing songs
from our Hungarian Unitarian traditions.
Even more than our church body, our lives are
transformed by being part of this church.
I know that my mind has been opened to many new ideas through this
church. My heart has grown bigger and
more open. And I don’t know about you,
but since becoming part of this church, I give away a lot more money and am a
lot more generous than I ever was before.
How many would say that your life has been transformed in some positive
ways since getting involved at All Souls?
For me, just knowing I’m part of a community that will
be there if I really need it, (and in my case has been there when I really needed it) allows me to live my life with
a little bit more comfort and security and hope. Knowing I am connected to a real community
that is based in values I agree with helps me know I am not out in this
incredible, sometimes tragic and often mysterious world all alone.
And this church gives us many opportunities to serve,
inside and outside of its walls.
Now,
for those who are wondering what all this has to do with the title of my
sermon, “The Happy Virus.” In a society
that is suffering from a lack of true community, in a culture where people feel
increasingly isolated and alienated, we (you and I) are part of a healthy,
thriving, loving community. It’s not
perfect, and it never will be, but it’s making a difference in many people’s
lives. Like the poet Hafiz wrote: If
you catch a virus that makes you this happy, why not tell everyone and invite
them to kiss you?
If we continue to be inviting, and continue to
transform people’s lives in positive ways, we will continue to have a very
contagious ministry in the world. And the
world desperately needs to be infected by a virus of justice and love and unity
and greater understanding. One that is
based in non-exclusive, non-dogmatic and life-affirming practices.
I-T-S: Invite,
Transform, Serve. May we spread it, far
and wide!