Solitude and Service

Posted on Mon, Feb 6, 2012

Mel Williams

SOLITUDE AND SERVICE Isaiah 40:21-31; Mark 1:29-39

A homily by Mel Williams

Watts Street Baptist Church

February 5, 2012

 

They who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength. (Isaiah 40:31)

Yesterday’s Fair Well party was filled with fun and festivity; and I’m filled with gratitude for each of you and for this church. But now in worship we are shifting to another way of lifting our spirits.

The Scripture today prompts me to say a word about solitude and service, prayer and mission. In these remaining weeks with you, I have wanted to say what has become clear to me. What are my Lessons Learned?

One of my major interests in ministry has been forging a vital relationship between prayer and social justice. My question is this: How can we harness the energy of the Spirit—within each of us—for service and action?

One of my mentors has been Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel, who was Professor of Mysticism and Ethics at Jewish Theological Seminary in New York. When you see the famous picture of Martin Luther King, Jr. marching in Selma, Alabama, the white bearded gentleman beside Dr. King is Rabbi Heschel. He said, “We are praying with our feet.” 

Jesus spent a lot of time with people. He was an activist preacher who also prayed with his feet; he was an agitator for the Kingdom, the Beloved Community. Last Sunday’s Luke 4 text summed up Jesus’ mission: good news to the poor, release to the captives, restoring sight to the blind, and proclaiming the Jubilee year when rights are restored to all. 

Jesus’ mission has now become our mission. At baptism we all say “Jesus is Lord.” If “Lord” is has an over-bearing connotation to you, then let’s re-phrase it as “Life Director.” Jesus is our Life Director, our Life Coach.

In the text today Jesus has been helping the sick and healing those with psychological hang-ups (they called them “demons.”) In the middle of all this action, the text has a simple sentence that may be the very key to Jesus’ mission. After Jesus is healing suffering people, casting out demons, traveling from town to town, preaching in various synagogues, then tucked in between all this action there is a quiet sentence: “In the morning, long before dawn, he got up and left the house, and went off to a lonely place and prayed.” Jesus knows he needs solitude; he’s looking for a quiet place, stillness, a time for breathing. After much togetherness, there is solitude.

I see this text modeling for us three movements that are crucial for our spiritual health. The three movements are 1. Solitude 2. Community and 3. Mission.

We know we’re headed into times of transition—for this church as you search for an interim pastor—and for me as I transition to retirement, which I like to call commencement. Transitions bring uncertainty and anxiety, which is why we need to anchor ourselves in our spiritual practice. Jesus is showing us the way, coaching us by example. He finds a deserted place, a “lonely place,” where he can be silent. 

Silence is essential, especially when our lives are in transition—and most of us are in one kind of transition or another. Transitions can clutter our minds and hearts; so many details, so much change—topsy turvy. That’s why we need times to collect ourselves, to center ourselves. We need our “lonely place” where we find again that Silence is the source of sound. 

 

The only way we can listen is to be silent. (Somebody said that’s why God gave us two ears and one mouth—so we will listen twice as much as we speak.) Nouwen defines solitude as “time alone with God.” He defines silence as “listening to God.” Sometimes we get too busy telling God all our troubles that we forget to listen. Solitude is essential; without solitude we can get out of balance. Silence is a time to “empty yourself and sit, content with the grace of God.”

After Jesus’ time in solitude and silence, his disciples came and found him. “Everybody is searching for you,” they said. The people wanted to be around Jesus. Here is the second movement—to community. We need to be together. Especially in times of change and transition, we need each other. We need each other for strength, challenge, encouragement. We borrow from each other’s energy. Community is essential if we are to find our way through tough times.

When the disciples came and found Jesus, he said to them, “Let’s get busy with our mission. Here’s the third movement: solitude to community to mission. “Let’s go to neighboring towns and take our message of God’s love, compassion, and healing.” Watts Street Baptist Church is a mission congregation, a justice church. Mission is at the heart of our life; in the future it must continue—with unflagging vigor.

We are fortunate now to have a child care mission initiative, with a strong group of leaders exploring how our church facilities might be used to provide affordable, quality childcare for low income residents who need to work. This is an enormous need in our city where as many as 2000 families are on the waiting list for affordable childcare. This is a promising mission for the future. I hope that mission will become a reality. Likewise, our 12 other mission groups continue to offer specific avenues for our members to be involved in continuing the mission and ministry of Jesus.

But we learn from Jesus that our mission must first be anchored in prayer and silence. The effectiveness of our missions is directly related to the effectiveness of our silence.

My grandfather, Watson Williams (“Papa”), was a simple man, a rag-tag farmer in the 1940s and 50s. Papa had an old mule that pulled a hand plow through the Moore County soil. When I was a child, I recall that Papa decided he needed a larger piece of land for his farming. So, he and his neighbors cut down bushes and pulled out stumps to prepare a new spot for gardening. Papa called the spot “new ground.” I can still hear him saying, “You want to walk with me over to New Ground?”

In a sense the coming transition is a time for clearing out brush and stumps for some new ground—where new crops will grow.

The crop image can instruct us further. When you plant, you’re tossing tiny seeds into “new ground,” seeds that will grow IN THE SILENCE. It takes patience to be a seed sower, a gardener. It requires good planning, planting, and then patience and waiting and trusting. 

Mel—Sing (Isaiah 40) They who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength. They shall mount up with wings like eagles. They shall run and not be weary. They shall walk and not faint. They who wait for the Lord will know peace.

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