First United Methodist Church, Birmingham, Michigan
November 21, 1999
Scripture: Ecclesiastes 9:7-12, 12:1-5
What do you say to someone when you are angry at them? I mean, really angry, and you want to reach into your arsenal of weapons for words that will hurt as they hit and poison as they penetrate. If it’s a marriage, you can always drop the “D” word. That usually gets attention. And if it’s not a marriage, there are words that begin with letters other than “D,” but I won’t enumerate them here. My favorite way of venting my spleen is with the “G” word….as in “grow up”…. “are you ever going to grow up?”….or “come back and talk to me when you decide to grow up.” It really gets to people when you question their maturity. It really gets to me when anybody questions mine.
It would take hours to list all the things that might be called “marks of maturity.” But no list would be complete without “discipline.” Life is a series of problems, suggests Scott Peck, but without discipline we can’t begin to solve any of them.
So if maturity is desirable, and discipline is the road by which one gets there, from when cometh discipline? Ah, says Scott Peck, that can be taught. There are four tools that can be used in the acquiring of discipline. And the first is the tool of“delayed gratification.” But what, pray tell, is that? Well, says Peck, the delaying of gratification is nothing more than the process by which one schedules life’s pain and pleasure, so as to enhance the pleasure by experiencing the pain first….thus getting it over with. It is, Peck concludes, the only decent way to live.
That idea intrigues me, for there is much truth in it. “Homework first, TV later,” they told me when I was a kid. It was probably the first sermon I ever heard on delayed gratification. Goodness knows, I heard it often enough. “Get the hard stuff out of the way first.” Which, more often than not, came out translated: “Get the unpleasant stuff out of the way first.”
Several years ago, I teased you with “the frosting test.” When you sit down before a wedge of cake, where does your fork go first….to the corner with the greatest concentration of frosting, or to the corner with the least? The implications are obvious. Every day, every life, every job, every marriage, indeed every human activity consists of some “crumby” cake and some “creamy” frosting. And the two cannot always be mixed in the same forkful. Would that they could. But cakes are not made that way. Neither is anything else. One can certainly “feast on frosting” first. But when it becomes repetitive and habitual, one becomes undisciplined and immature. I think most of us know this.
But, as with all such lessons, sometimes we over-learn them. We take them too much to heart, blinding us to whatever truth there may be on the other side. Which is why I want to confound you this morning by suggesting there is a case to be made for gratification….and something to be said for taking it where you find it, even in the give-and-take of the here-and-now.
Toward that end, let me advance several propositions.
Most of us want to be happy.
Many of us do not know how to be happy.
A goodly number of us aren’t happy.
Some of us assume we will be happy later.
A few us of suspect we will never be happy.
I am not overly concerned this morning with those who will never be happy. Their condition is pathological, which is to say that it resides inside them. Happiness will never come to them because they will never open the door and let it in. Or out. Should it knock, they will poison it with guilt, club it to death with anger, or smother it under blankets of depression. The Gospel has words to say to them, but they will have to wait to hear them on another Sunday. But since pathologically unhappy people do not want to hear words which will make them feel better, my failure to say them will probably make them happy (in a strange and perverse sort of way).
I am more concerned with those who are looking for happiness and failing to find it, because of their present circumstances. I am also concerned with those who are not looking for happiness, because they expect it will only come later in life. And I am most concerned with those who are finding it, but mistrusting it, because they fear it will not last. Collectively, these are the people who are holding out for better times, better terms and better guarantees.
If any of this fits you this Thanksgiving, I would commend a careful reading of the Book of Ecclesiastes. It is a small book, barely a dozen pages long. They have tucked it into the Old Testament in a place where no one ever finds it. But there is nothing like it in all of scripture. On the surface, it sounds like the cynical rantings of a skeptical man….one who doubts God and questions the value of doing good. “What point is there in working hard?” he asks at the outset of his treatise. “Generations come, generations go; nothing changes much.”
In one of his oft-repeated lines, he writes: “Vanity of vanities; all is vanity.” But a better translation of the Hebrew might substitute the word “puffery” for the word “vanity.” “All is puffery; nothing lasts.” It is to suggest that everything is as a breath of exhaled air that soon disappears, or a balloon that is in the process of losing its helium.
He continues on: “Man has no superiority over the beasts, since both come to the same untimely end.” Or: “In my own brief life, I have seen that a good man perishes in spite of his goodness, while men of wickedness endure in spite of their wicked ways.” And who can forget his most famous warning: “I have seen that the race is not always to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, but time and chance happen to them all.” Now I ask you, does anyone else in the Bible talk like that?
Who is this man? Well, ‘tis hard to say. There are those who claim that this is the work of Solomon. There is a school of thought that has King Solomon writing three books of the Bible. When he was young and in love, he wrote the semi-erotic love poetry of the Song of Songs. When he matured and turned his mind toward making a living, he wrote the practical wisdom of the Book of Proverbs. And when he grew old and cynical, he voiced the futility we read in Ecclesiastes. Were that so, I could understand it. As a young buck, I had to monitor my speech for undertones of eroticism. Now that I am a not-so-young buck, I have to monitor my speech for overtones of cynicism.
But it is virtually certain that the writer is not Solomon. Even his pen name (“Koheleth,” in the Hebrew) is not really so much a name as a title, meaning “one who convenes the assembly.” But while we cannot know his identity, we can surmise certain things about his life. At one time he was rich….and may still be at the time of writing. Certainly he is wise, perhaps even a respected teacher of his time. Moreover, he is a man of faith….even a God-fearing man…. one who trusts that God has his ways, even if man is totally incapable of understanding them.
Yet he is frustrated because his riches, his knowledge and his faith can take him only so far. He laments: “I know that life must have some meaning, but I cannot grasp it. I have been permitted to see pieces of truth, but I can never see truth except in pieces. I can contemplate things eternal, yet I am a creature of time….a prisoner of time. And sooner or later, time will pin me to the mat for the count, just as it has pinned everybody else for the count. Some early. Some late.”
“Who can comprehend God? Reality lies beyond my grasp. And deep, so deep, who can discover it?” It is a complaint that reads very much like a prayer. But then, so do my complaints….read like prayers, I mean.
I suppose there is something of the cynic in Ecclesiastes. He seems to take satisfaction in puncturing the balloons of the pious, whose answers he has tried and found wanting. But I find myself joining with a number of others who see him as a man more hungry than cynical. I see him as a man crying out: “Am I set on earth for one brief moment, merely to keep the species alive and then get out of the way of the next generation so that it, too, will be able to reproduce, grow old and die? Has God planted within me a hunger which cannot be satisfied….a hunger for meaning and significance?”
Ah, but let me tell you, that (in the midst of his frustration) the writer has fashioned an answer. It is one to which he returns on six separate occasions. “Go,” he says, “eat your bread in gladness and drink your wine in joy. Enjoy happiness with someone you love. Whatever is in your power to do, do it with all your might. Be content in your work. Cast worry from your heart. Enjoy your years, however many there may be.”
At first glance, it doesn’t sound like much. It carries a tone of resignation, as if advising us to put a happy face on a bad situation. It is not all that far removed from: “Eat, drink and be merry, for tomorrow we may die.” But, even if that be the case, do not dismiss whatever truth may be found there. Tomorrow we may die. So the question becomes, can we learn to live in the face of that fact in ways that will generate meaning for us, and pleasure in us?
If logic tells you that life is a meaningless accident (says the author), don’t give up on life, give up on logic. If logic tells you that, in the long run, nothing makes a difference because we will all die and disappear, then don’t just live in the long run. Learn to savor the moment, even if it does not last forever. More to the point, learn to savor the moment, precisely because it will not last forever. Moments of our lives can be eternal without being everlasting.
Can you understand that? Can you see how moments of our lives can be eternal without being everlasting? A moment can come, and it can be so precious….so priceless….so pregnant with meaning….that even though it comes in time, goes in time, and cannot be frozen in time, it hints at something that lasts forever. I’ll bet every one of you can close your eyes and remember something….some place….someone….that fits that description. I’ll bet you can remember a word….a look….a touch….perchance, a kiss…..that may have happened years ago, or may have happened yesterday. Which may not have lasted long at all, but (in another sense) has lasted all these years and is still going strong.
“Go eat your bread in gladness and drink your wine in joy.” Do not always hold out for better times… better terms…better guarantees. There may not be any. For time and chance do happen to us all.
The late senator Paul Tsongas was one of my heroes. In January of 1984, he announced to the people of Massachusetts that he would not stand for reelection to the Senate. Paul Tsongas was a rising star. People were often heard to link the words “Tsongas” and “White House” in the same conversation. But Paul Tsongas had his reasons for stepping down. “A few weeks ago,” he said, “I learned I had a form of lymphatic cancer that could, if I was careful, be contained but not cured. It has forced me to consider that there are some things I would rather do than write my country’s laws or get my name in history’s books….things like watching my children grow up.”
After he made his decision known, a friend offered congratulations on making such a difficult choice. To which Paul Tsongas responded: “It was only a difficult decision until I realized I had never heard anybody say on their deathbed that they wished they had spent more time at the office.” No one redeems us from death. But we can be redeemed from the “shadow of death.” Which is to say that death will come, but it needn’t block the light. “Go eat your bread in gladness. Go drink your wine in joy.”
With that decision, Paul Tsongas put some distance between himself and death’s shadow. Alas, however, he couldn’t ultimately separate himself from death, which tracked him down and tackled him for a loss. Our loss.
As death did, last Friday morning, to Bob Talbert. Tackled him for a loss, I mean. Wrestled him right to the turf, just when it looked like he might wrinkle free of its grasp….leaving us “moanin” on Friday, just like it was Monday.
You can’t keep a good man down, of course. Which will preach. Because I intend to preach it (a week from Tuesday) when Bob’s friends….how could there be any strangers….will gather in this sanctuary to commit the stories to memory, and the man to God.
Part of what we’re going to remember is a man who could take what everyone else called “ordinary”….hold it up to the light….twist it and turn it, this way and that….and find something in it that was funny, lovely, or (occasionally) holy….although Bob might not have called it such. As a columnist, he gave us (his readers) the ultimate compliment. He paid attention to our lives. And then wrote about them as if they truly mattered.
Our Jewish neighbors have several holidays. Some of which are known to us. Some of which are not. Among the lesser known is Succoth, which is the remnant of an old harvest festival. It recalls the days when the Israelites were farmers. It is, to be sure, a prototype for our American Thanksgiving. Devout Jews celebrate Succoth by building a small annex or lean-to onto their homes. It is just a few boards, really, interlaced with some branches. Jews invite their friends to sit in it, eating a little fruit and drinking a little wine. It is a celebration of things that do not last in a little hut that does not last. The winds of autumn will soon blow the shelter to the ground. The fruits of autumn will spoil if not eaten quickly. The friends of autumn (who come to eat and drink) may not be with us as long as we might like. For Succoth always comes in the fall. Summer is over. Light is less. Dark is more. Leaves have divorced themselves from the trees. Evenings whisper with the chill of winter.
But Succoth comes as if to say that the world is full of good and beautiful things….food and drink….flowers and sunsets….friends and time for sharing them. But these are things that need to be enjoyed right away because they will not last. They will not wait for us to finish other things in order to get around to them. We “eat our bread in gladness” because, if we don’t, it will rot….or we will. Ironically, the assigned text, designated for annual reading in the Synagogue during the time of Succoth, is the Book of Ecclesiastes. Let me read just a bit more as I close.
Remember your Creator in the days of your youth,
Before evil days come, and the years approach,
When you say: “These give me no pleasure.”
The day when those who keep the house tremble,
And strong men are bowed;
When the women grind no longer at the mill,
Because day darkens at the windows,
And the street doors are shut.
When the sound of the mill is faint;
When the voice of the bird is silenced,
And song notes are stilled.
When to go uphill is an ordeal.
And a walk is something to dread.
Yet….yet
The almond tree is in flower;
The belly of the grasshopper is heavy with food,
And the caper bush bears its fruit.
My friends….my increasingly dear and precious friends….in the midst of what you lack, be attentive to what you have. In the midst of those who have hurt you, be attentive to those who have healed you. In the midst of tears, be especially attentive to laughter. Learn to recognize moments that are eternal, if not everlasting. Then drink their sweetness dry. Go eat your bread in gladness. Go drink your wine in joy. For if you do….if you really do….happiness and gratitude will come naturally from you, and fit comfortably on you.
