Wadhams United Church of Christ
2569 County Route 10, Wadhams, NY 12993
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Sermon by Steve Smith Order of Service
The Deep Places January 20, 2008
More than 20 years ago, I did some reflections on a cross-country ski jaunt I had taken, and thought it would be interesting to revisit that journey and those thoughts with you this morning. I was in much better shape back then. Mind you, these days I’m winded more easily, and I’ve come to dislike the profuse sweating, the icicles that form in my nose, and the contortions I have to go through. And that’s just from putting my boots on and trying to jam them into the clamps on the skis! So sit back and relax (not so much that you fall asleep, of course) and imagine yourself in a winter wonderland right in our back yard, right here in the Adirondacks.
One of the activities that helps to renew me at this time of the year is a vigorous outing on my cross-country skis. One of my favorite places to go any time of year is a private one-lane dirt road that winds its way up into the hills behind the Ausable Club in St. Huberts. For those of you who aren’t familiar with the spot, it’s located on Route 73 between Keene Valley and the Northway. The Ausable Club was founded by a group of wealthy folks who enjoyed vacationing in the Adirondacks. They became concerned over the way the forests were being stripped by lumbering interests, so they bought up huge plots of land in that area to preserve the wilderness for their leisurely pursuits.
There is something almost enchanted about the forest there, with the Ausable River gurgling and splashing its way down the mountains to the valley below. The muffled sounds of the stream skidding beneath its icy, wintry blanket; the scent of balsam and evergreen mingles with the clear freshness of the air; and the preserve protects the wildlife there from hunters, so it is fairly common to encounter deer in the woods or along the trail. It’s a quiet haven that renews my soul. The road will eventually take you up to the Lower Ausable Lake, which is one of those woodland inspirations where mountain meets winding lake. But the trail up to the lake is a constant climb.
Until that particular day 21 years ago, I had never made it all the way in to the lake on my skis. I had hiked it in warmer weather, but my stamina was lacking for the extra exertion of a seven mile round trip on skis. Even on that particular day, I hadn’t planned on going the whole distance. My 2 p.m. departure left about two and a half hours before dusk. But when I passed the 2.5 mile marker after an hour’s ski, I decided to go for broke. Besides, I told myself, the trip back would be mostly downhill, since the trip up was mostly uphill. “I should be able to coast back down once I make it up there,” I said to myself in an affirmation designed to inspire courage and perseverance.
Have you ever given yourself those kinds of messages when you’re trying to focus on reaching a goal? Do you ever tell yourself that you can handle the added stress you’re bringing on yourself, because once you reach your destination or your goal, you’ll be able to coast through life after that? Do you ever try to inspire courage and perseverance in yourself by embracing the thought that it will be a downhill breeze after what you’re going through to get there?
Having passed the last two skiers a mile previously, my sense of solitude was broken only by the harsh sounds of someone panting and wheezing over their labored breathing. Since I was the only one in sight, I reached the brilliant conclusion that I must be the one making all the noise. My gaze of the peaceful surroundings had developed the characteristics of a glassy stare, and each new hill brought a fresh burst of energy. Or was that a fresh outburst of cursing? After 20 years, the details get a little hazy.
All I know is that my weariness and fatigue were dogging my steps more closely than the shrinking shadow behind me. What kept me going on this grand adventure was an abiding vision of being able to coast all the way back down the hill to my car, hardly having to lift a ski in the process. I even wondered if I would get a chill from not having to exert myself on my downhill slide. At long last, I came bursting over the final hill at the end of the road, swooping down the long, slow downhill curve and out onto the windswept lake. The view that day was incredible, and it combined with my sense of achievement to leave me feeling exhilarated (and literally breathless)!
Snow-capped mountain peaks gave the appearance of tumbling toward water’s edge, while wind-driven snow came bounding and swirling through the valley and across the lake in the frantic dance of winter’s whirling dervish. The brilliance of the scene still plays across the corners of my mind; it stands out as a real taste of mountain’s majesty kneeling down to form a vee shape to frame the frozen lake. The winding headwaters of the Lower Lake eluded my gaze behind rising hills and a sharp bend in its snowy cap, but the wings of the wind seemed to bear its frozen treasures toward me as I stood as still as possible to absorb its beauty, frozen in time and ice, and now etched indelibly in memory.
Having heard and felt the whispers of God’s Spirit moving across the face of the deep places, deep in the woods, deep in the hills and mountains, I turned to make my way back. As you may recall, my final dramatic approach to the lake had involved a long, slow downhill curve. I had to painstakingly attack that same hill on the way back, and for some reason, it didn’t have the same dramatic appeal that it did on the way in. Once I crested that hill, I told myself, I could start coasting. It didn’t take long before I realized that my sustaining vision for the return trip had been a rosy-colored fantasy.
With each aching forward thrust of my skis, I questioned my sanity in making the trip. Each time the next downhill glide came to an end and I had to lift my ski for another stroke, I wondered what in the world I had been thinking all the way in. While the gentle downhill slope made the skiing easier, it was nowhere near the effortless coasting I had envisioned all along the way up. With thighs burning, calves tightening, and that eerie huffing and puffing and wheezing echoing through the woods, I labored against fatigue, gathering darkness, some hypothermia, and probably a little dehydration to work my way back to the car. The gloom within me was settling in faster than the darkness, but I finally dragged myself alongside my parked car and eased my weary body into the driver’s seat.
Reflecting on my experience a few weeks later, it struck me that we often carry around a fantasy of coasting downhill after achieving a goal. We imagine that life will be easier and our problems more manageable AFTER we get married, or buy a new home, or get a promotion, or retire, or AFTER we make it through the upcoming medical procedure, or AFTER we downsize our home, or AFTER that windfall comes in to help our finances. Nor are people of faith immune from the illusion. We imagine that faith will come easier to us AFTER we find the right church or hire the right pastor, or AFTER new people start coming to church, or AFTER we experience God in some spectacular way, or AFTER God answers our prayers the way we want. Somehow we get it in our heads that God will seem more real and we will be more spiritual AFTER we witness a miracle, or figure something out, or sustain a spiritual practice, or bring a nasty habit under divine control, or conquer a problem under divine inspiration, or AFTER we work through a crisis under God’s crystal-clear guidance.
It comes as something of a shock or disappointment when reality fails to live up to our fantasy, doesn’t it? Once we achieve our goal or realize our dream, we discover that there’s always another hill to climb, another long drudging trail to follow, more fatigue to battle. Always there is another problem or crisis to manage, another medical problem to endure, another goal to set, a deadline to meet, a dream to pursue. In our weariness, the gloom can settle in, and all we want is to be able to coast through life for a little while. It’s then that we can be surprised by the eerie sounds of our own exertion echoing back to us through the forest of issues and concerns that still need to be navigated. It’s then that the chill sets in, the muscles tense painfully, and every forward step or thrust is answered by the ache of our letdown.
But as I sat and pondered where I had been and what it had cost me, I found my thoughts returning again and again to some strident and brilliant words that Jesus had proclaimed to a world grown weary of struggling and hurting, but never getting anywhere in life. He said, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life.” He reminds me that life is more than a series of hills to be climbed, more than an endless trail of exertion that doesn’t take us anywhere in particular, more than our glazed and icy gaze can comprehend in the midst of our labors and trials. He wants to take us higher and deeper than we’ve ever gone before; he wants to show us the deeper things of God; but we have to be willing to take the trip.
We have to be willing to break a sweat, to go through some contortions along the way, and to put up with icicles that form in our nostrils. We have to be willing, he tells us, to go the extra mile for someone in need, to push a little harder to be loving toward the people that drive us nuts, to sacrifice a little more to see our dreams become a reality. The view in store for us, the experience awaiting us at trail’s end, will be truly breathtaking and exhilarating, but in the meantime we have to hold on just a little while longer.
If we never undertake the journey, we will never find the way. In walking with Christ, life itself becomes the Way. The journey into the deep places of God will indeed be strenuous; the path that lies beyond our goals and dreams may be much more work than we bargained for; and we may never arrive at the point where we can coast the rest of the way. But here and there along the way, God will give us a little foretaste of what is to come. It may be the thrill of holding the gift of life in our arms in the form of a child or grandchild. It may be the sheer exhilaration we sometimes encounter in nature. It may be the quiet satisfaction of seeing an answer to prayer. It may be that mysterious sense of awe from just having had an encounter with God.
The importance is in the journey of life, and how we live it. This is where God is eager to meet us: at the critical moments in life when we wish we didn’t have to tackle the next hill in front of us; at the turning points in life where crucial decisions have to be made; at the peaks of joy and in the hollows of depression, distress, and discouragement. God would come bounding and swirling through the valleys of our lives, sometimes disguised as winter’s whirling dervish, sometimes speaking through the muffled gurgling of a stream cozied up beneath its wintry blanket.
In perfect majesty, God would kneel in perfect majesty to frame the living of our days with a glorious love that sustains us through each and every challenge, each and every trial, each and every day. God would meet us in the ache of muscle, the throb of grief, and the tension of stress, to give us what we need for the next step, the next stride along the way. God would breathe God’s own breath to fill the empty places in our air-starved lungs. And though the ends of our paths may elude our gaze, always the wings of the wind will find a way to deliver the treasures of God’s loving Spirit toward us.
Order of Service back to sermon
"NC" refers to The New Century Hymnal, The Pilgrim Press (1995)
20 January 2008
Welcome, Announcements & Prayer Requests
A Candle for Peace NC #570, verse 6
Call to Worship
Leader: Faithful and loving God, you have given us the breath of life, you have given us your Spirit. Strengthen us in this hour.
People: God of promise and light, open our eyes this morning, that we may see your light in the darkness. Nurture our lives, and bless us, we pray.
Leader: You have given us all that we need to be your church. Pour out your grace upon us. Help us trust that your grace IS sufficient.
People: As we worship, let your Spirit move through us and open our hearts and minds to hear your call. May this time of worship bring us closer to you, that your light and love may transform our lives.
ALL: With gratitude and trust and love, we pray. Amen.
Hymn NC #86 When Morning Gild the Skies
Responsive Prayer
Leader: Merciful God, you know our strengths and our weaknesses. Our doubts, our fears, our weaknesses are not hidden from your sight, nor our strengths, our potentials, our joys.
People: We have failed to live as we should, often putting our desires and wants ahead of your command to love and serve. You know where we most need to listen, and where we most need to act.
Leader: Forgive us for speaking when you need us to be silent. Forgive us for sitting still when you need us to move forward. For all the sin that permeates our lives, we beg your mercy and pray your pardon.
People: Wash over us with your mercy and grace, that we may find strength even in our weakness. May your Spirit work within us to spark and kindle our faith, to give us courage to be your hands and eyes and heart in the world.
Leader: Call to us with persistence and trust, that we may answer your call to live as your disciples.
People: Be our shelter, O God; be that place in our souls where prayers are answered and peace is found. May we feel the touch of your incredible love, and know that the gift of your new life is within us.
Pastoral Prayer, Lord’s Prayer
Hymn NC #42 O For a Thousand Tongues Psalm 40:1-11, Isaiah 49:1-7, John 14:1-14
Sermon The Deep Places
Offering, Doxology, Dedication
Hymn NC #82 God Be With You
Benediction
Leader: Wondrous God, today you have strengthened and blessed us. Continue to strengthen us with Christ’s steadfast love.
People: We praise you, Lord, for your abundant gifts. Help us to use them in such a way that we may be your promise of hope to a world of need.
Leader: Let your unending love and constant faithfulness shine through us, that we may truly be your people on this earth.
People: We give thanks to our God who is loving and merciful. We trust in the One who calls us each by name.
Leader: May the blessing of Almighty God fill you with peace and joy
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