Dr. William A. Ritter
First United Methodist Church
Birmingham, Michigan
Scriptures: Matthew 16:13-20, 3rd John 1:13-15
November 16, 2003
Fred Craddock writes:
When I was a kid, I went to church with my mother. The minister of our little church would speak to my mother. “How’re you, Miz Craddock?” he would ask. And the five of us kids would go along like little ducks after our mother. “How’re you, Sonny? How’re you, Honey? How’re you, Sonny? How’re you, Honey?” Always the same. Sunday after Sunday. But I remember when another minister came to our church and about his fifth or sixth Sunday, he said: “Fred, how’re you doing?” He was the best minister that ever was at that church. Because there’s a whole lot of difference between “Sonny” and “Fred.”
I suppose by now that all of you have read Steve Eisenhard’s moving testimonial on the inside pages of your Steeple Notes. Most of us know how well Steve and Meriwether sing. Now we also know how well they write. And how much, in a very short time, they have come to know and love this church.
Steve references that mythical bar in Boston where (allegedly) “everybody knows your name.” A couple of years ago, I entered it….and they didn’t. But hey, nobody’s perfect. Steve’s letter suggests that he would like us to shout “Steve” when we see him coming through the door. But I don’t think he expects it when he’s processing down the aisle. Although I see no reason not to humor him, given how well he just sang this morning. So on the count of three, let’s hear it. “Steve.”
Although the first time most of us make it into the sanctuary, somebody (if not everybody) calls out our name. I’m talking about baptism. Which is about a good many things like blessing, believing and committing. But it is also about naming. My late maternal grandmother….the one I affectionately refer to as “the old Yugoslav”….celebrated a pair of days each year. One of them she called her “birthday.” The other of which she called her “name day.” Meaning her baptism. In the Old Country, a child’s name was never used within the family prior to baptism. Instead, she was called “the baby.” Then at baptism the priest said “Agnes.” And Agnes she was.
Names are important, signifying (as they do in baptism) that that’s how God knows us….individually….personally….by name rather than number. For all I know, God may watch All My Children. But God knows each child. The last instruction I give to a family on the Saturday before baptism is this: “Remember, when you give her to me, whisper her full name. For at that moment, I have nothing in my hands, a live microphone on my belt, and no mispronunciations of a child’s name in 39 years. And I have no plans to end that streak tomorrow.”
Of course, not everybody wants their name known in church. A few Saturdays ago, we had an obnoxious wedding photographer who so bullied our wedding coordinator that a pair of ushers felt a need to come to her rescue. Approaching him angrily but diplomatically, I inquired as to whether he had a business card. Cautiously, with his mind on what had happened previously, he asked me why I wanted it. When I said, “So I can do my small but humble part to see that you never work here again,” he refused to surrender it. Meaning that he left anonymously. Albeit nervously.
There’s a certain security in anonymity. “If they don’t know me, they can’t expect anything of me….or address anything to me.” Which explains the existence of anonymous pew sitters (who never bother me) and anonymous letter writers (who always do). Years ago, in a previous church, I would get regular sermon critiques written all over the order of worship and mailed to me….unsigned. In this instance I knew the pen man because, out of the corner of my eye, I could see him writing his critiques in the choir. Eventually he conceded my ability and the critiques stopped.
But I still get unsigned epistles….more than you would think. And if a preacher ever tells you he has learned how to ignore them, don’t believe him. One writer said: “I am leaving this unsigned so that you can devote full attention to your problem, rather than trying to psych out the one who is pointing it out to you.” But when the author is “nobody,” it could be anybody. Or everybody. I mean, it could be you. Or you. Or even you. And it takes two or three days before you can relax and stop assuming that the writer is the person whose path you crossed last.
But the real problem I have with unsigned letters is that, day after day, week after week, I lay it all out there in the open….22 minutes each Sunday….a page and a half each Thursday….nothing concealed….everything revealed. In short, my life (publicly and professionally) carries my signature. Leading me to wonder why anybody, in responding to me, would withhold theirs. But in a world where some like to hear their name, it isn’t all that strange that others like to hide their name.
And there are, of course, people who like to drop a name….theirs, or somebody else’s. That’s because names have the power to influence or impress. Occasionally, I’ll be trying to help someone by making a connection for them….a connection to someone who might help them better than I can help them (such as a doctor, a lawyer, a marriage counselor, or the social worker at some agency). But I know that when they make that call, there might be no connection. Because everybody is busy….everybody’s schedule is jammed….everybody’s calendar is crowded. And the person who could help them won’t know them. But that person will know me. Not because of what I bring to the table, but because of what this church brings to the table. So while I’m telling them who to call, I also tell them to use my name. Because it may open a door or two. Not always. And not forever. But occasionally. At least while I’m here.
But names are also dropped for status, as in: “You’ll never guess who I had dinner with last night….” or “Just the other day, when I was talking to….” Should Steve Eisenhard regale the choir with some funny little thing that happened while rehearsing with “Luciano,” there would be eyebrows raised all over the Robing Room over the fact that Steve knows Pavarotti….has sung with Pavarotti….and is on a first name basis with Pavarotti.
Hear a name. Hide a name. Drop a name. Let’s ratchet this up a bit and talk about what it means to name a name. As in naming the name. As in naming Jesus’ name. The Bible is fairly clear that Jesus is “the name that is above every other name.” Which, while not eliminating all other names, certainly reprioritizes the list.
In the old days, this season of the church year was called Kingdomtide. And next Sunday was termed the Festival of Christ the King. In fact, that’s one of the reasons we keep Rod around, given that Episcopalians tend to remember such things. But few churches celebrate the Festival of Christ the King, given other institutional priorities like Pledge Sunday and other national priorities like Thanksgiving Sunday. Besides, words like “king” (or “queen,” for that matter) are foreign to us. Literally foreign to us. As kings go, we in this country neither have nor want one. And while many organizations are big on installations….and many denominations are big on ordinations….I don’t know any group that is big on coronations. They sound pretentious and audacious. And people who are “into coronations” are thought to be just a little bit full of themselves.
Which leads Mary Anderson to observe that for those who find kingly language culturally cumbersome, there are any number of American Christians willing to refashion Jesus into our CEO….or, better yet, our therapist (Jesus, the wounded healer). But when the word “king” is separated from the name “Jesus,” what is lost is not so much a title as a relationship. Writes Mary:
To say Christ is King implies that you and I are subjects. The heart of this relationship is our dependence on a ruler who holds our lives in his hands. We do not choose a ruler. But we do elect a president, hire a CEO and contract with a therapist. Kingly language (when associated with Jesus) requires that we acknowledge his lordship over our lives and submit ourselves willingly to it.
Over the years we have been together, you and I, some of us have shared a healthy debate (at least I think it has been a healthy debate) over the nature of the Kingdom.
To what degree is it here and now?
To what degree is it there and then?
To what degree is it a mixture of here and now and there and then?
Is it happening within history?
Or will it require the total annihilation of history?
In short, is the Book of Revelation to be read more like poetry or prophecy?
We don’t all agree about the Kingdom’s location. Even more to the point, we don’t all agree about the Kingdom’s population.
How many? How few?
How broad? How narrow?
Some saved? All saved?
Many damned? Any damned?
Then, from our respective camps, we turn to scripture, pleased to find that a case can be made on every side. The temptation being to cluster ourselves with the like-minded, and to assume that those who differ are either absent minded or narrow minded.
But whatever be your take on the Kingdom….or my take on the Kingdom….make no mistake about the fact that its king is my king. And Jesus has been my king since somewhere around the twelfth or thirteenth year of my life.
Known by me.
Owned by me.
Adored by me.
Served by me.
One day, in a small north-Galilean town that we can now locate in the Golan Heights, Peter said to Jesus: “Oh my gosh, I know who you are.” To which Jesus said: “You are a rock. I can build a church on people like you.” Which he did. And does. On my back. And on yours. Not because any of us know how it’s all going to come out. But because we know who will be in charge when it does.
Hear a name. Hide a name. Drop a name. Name a name. Finally, share a name. Fred Craddock began us. So let Fred close us.
A few years ago in a church in Oklahoma where I was worshiping with my family, I had an afternoon engagement and had to leave right after the benediction. In order to get to the parking lot quickly, I cut through the back, through the choir room. I said to one of the women in the choir as she was putting away her robe, “I appreciated very much the anthem this morning.”
She said, “I hope so, because that’s it.”
I said, “What do you mean?”
She said, “That’s it. I’m hanging it up.” She was putting away her robe.
I said, “Are you retiring?” She’d been in the choir 103 or 104 years; I thought she was retiring.
She said, “No, I’m quitting.”
I said, “You’re quitting?”
She said, “I’m quitting.”
“Oh, you’re not quitting.”
“I’m quitting.”
“Well, why are you quitting?”
She said, “I sat up there in the choir loft this morning and looked around at the other choir members. I looked at the minister and looked at the worship leader. I looked at the ushers and just looked out over the congregation. I said finally to myself what has haunted me for years.”
I said, “What’s that?”
She said, “Who cares?”
Well, I was in a hurry. I had a speech to make, so I said, “Oh, you’ll be all right. Take an aspirin, you’ve got a headache, all right?” I went to the parking lot, but all the way to my engagement and all the way back I thought of that indictment. I was a member of that church, and she was indicting me and all the members. In fact, if it were true, what she had said was, “This is not a church.” If her opinion after long-time membership there was that the sum gesture of that church was a shrug of the shoulders, then it was not a church.
When I got home that afternoon, I called that lady. I said, “I want to talk to you.”
She said, “If you want to.”
I said, “I want to.” I went over there; we talked, and brusquely we disagreed. I finally asked her, “Well, what would we have to do to show that we cared?”
And this was her definition. She said, “Take me seriously.” That was a strange way to put it, especially for her. She was a comic, a stick of peppermint; she was always playing practical jokes. She would pin tails of choir robes together. She would go early and put some big cartoon on the pulpit so that when the minister came out in all his sobriety, he’d look down and be blown out of the water. She was that kind of person, so I said, “You can’t be serious! Take you seriously? What are you talking about? You’re always joking, laughing.”
And she said, “You bought all that? I thought it was rather transparent, myself. I like to be taken seriously.”
When I left that lady’s house, I said to her, “You’re wrong, you’re wrong.”
She said, “I’m not.”
I said, “I get to travel to churches all over the country, and everywhere I go there are people who care for each other. They take care of each other.”
She said, “Where?”
I said, “Everywhere I go, there are people who care.”
She said, “Really?”
“Yes.”
She said, “Name some.”
She wants names. May I use your name? Is it okay if I give her your name?
Note: For those not familiar with Fred Craddock’s preaching, his stories have been collected in an anthology. As for Mary Anderson, her comments on the Festival of Christ the King can be read in the most recent issue of The Christian Century.
