Rector's Sermon
23 January 2011

First Reading	Psalm	Epistle	Gospel
Isaiah 9:1–4	Psalm 27:1, 15	Corinthians 1:10–18	Matthew 4:12–23

      It was a special afternoon on a weekend, when my father would take me to watch trains. There were plenty of places outside of Albany where a rural road ran parallel to the mainline of the New York Central and one could pull off on the shoulder, with just a few feet of short weeds separating you from the rail bed. The freight trains of that era were not the monotonous unit trains of today where three identical engines pulled a hundred identical hopper cars or coal cars or piggyback trailer cars. No, the freight trains were made up of cars from railroads of every section of the country and were as varied as the states from which they came. It was not unusual to spot cars from railroads that we had never heard of before. The engineer and fireman in the cab would often wave, and so would the brakeman on the caboose at the end of every train. Steam engines had long disappeared by my time, but the engines were rarely the same, and like the automobiles of Ford, General Motors and Chrysler, reflected the styling peculiarities of the competing locomotive builders. The stylishly designed streamlined passenger trains, all with the shiny matching cars, passed by at night and the passenger trains in the afternoon were usually the slow locals that might travel as far as their proud extra fare sister trains, but took considerably longer and were for more ordinary folks. Their cars were always more interesting because they were always mismatched. Behind the engine were the front-end baggage cars that looked like they hadn’t been cleaned or painted since the end of World War II. The sleepers were usually fairly new, extra spares for the name trains; the coaches, middle aged, but better equipped than the worn commuter cars, and the observation and dinning cars were aged dowagers, still displaying their pedigree, but long retired from the first class runs. However, the engineers would smile and wave and there was also usually a Pullman porter looking out from one of the open top sections of the car doors and grinning as the train whizzed by. Every train was  special and each one was different. There was always a wait, but I began to learn that difficult, but profound lesson that waiting, anticipating, and hoping for something could be part of the sweetness of life. When I went to look for trains, I expected to find them and all the romance that went with it.

       Somehow, the passing trains also connected me to a larger reality. The train crew and the passengers were all en route on journeys. Life was not static, and the rails disappearing in the distance were beckoning me not to be afraid of undertaking journeys, too, and being willing to venture to destinations about which I could only faintly dream.

       I like to think that Jesus treated every one of his disciples as special. He likely had met and had dinner with their families, knew the towns that they grew up in, and was knowledgeable of their skills or trade.  They weren’t chosen just to fill a slot. Part of Jesus’ strong appeal was that when he talked to you he gave you his full, undivided attention with no future agenda running through his mind competing with what you were asking him. That’s what made Jesus so different. Jesus made God’s word so clear, so close, so real and compelling. Like the trail of cinder dust and smell of the vapor from the steam lines as the trains passed, with Jesus, the Holy Spirit filled one’s senses. One’s whole body felt Jesus’ presence. 

      Being invited to have supper with Jesus meant being engaged, being connected to Jesus. Supper with Him was never totally predictable and certainly never boring.  I’d like to think that maybe after every meal with Jesus, following long evening discussions as the disciples saw night settle across the calm lake water of Galilee, new dreams were born and grew as fast as the vine in Jack and the Beanstalk.

       People of faith need their ability to be awed, to be surprised, to find themselves drawn in and involved encouraged and nourished. Worship, in some way, means involvement in the work of God.  Jesus calls us to get into it, to participate, to feel it, not just to sit back and observe it.  A church that just seeks followers will ultimately become a dying church. Jesus calls us to lead others to the living Lord where they in turn become leaders, and where expectation sets off the sparks that set imagination on fire, where a larger sense of human connectedness and the wonder of creation shakes us, as surely as a train rattles the ground and everything around it as it roars by. We need to help each other learn how to invite and lead people to experience a time of spiritual train watching. I wonder if the great challenge of the church in our age might be to help people connect their lives with a sense of the Holy, a reality much larger than their own personal world, and to help them recover the insight that God is the greatest giver of dreams.

       And I offer this to you in the name of the Living God, Amen.