"In His Name"
"In His Name"
A sermon preached February 9, 2003 by the Reverend John Morgan at the First Unitarian
Universalist Church, Reading, Pa
The "In His Name" is intentional. The communion table in the church I serve has these words
carved along one side. It's this side which has turned away from the congregation. Ironically, the
wood in the table is from Dr. George De Benneville's home, Thomas Potter's chapel in New
Jersey and the Ephrata Cloisters from which Universalist missionaries set out to share the good
news.
This is a very personal sermon. In truth, I wrote it for myself, to be clear about where my life
journey has brought me. I hope I do not sound like the person who talked about himself for a long
time before saying to a friend: "Okay, that's enough about me; let's talk about you. What do you
think of me?"
I want to talk about the fact that I am back to dealing with that Zen-like, Mediterranean peasant
who wandered around the villages talking about the kingdom of God and turning the notion of
being a messiah upside down preaching about nonviolence, questioning religious authorities,
speaking in parables, and otherwise making a nuisance of himself not only to his family and
friends, but finally to the political powers. He was crucified, died, and, according to a few friends,
came back to prove his point about love being stronger than death.
On the night before he died, Jesus met with his disciples at Gethsemane, The earliest Gospel
writer, Mark, says Jesus was fearful and distressed.
He asked his disciples to stay awake with him, but they fell asleep. And Jesus prayed for the
strength to bear whatever came his way, "Thy will, not mine, "was always his deepest prayer.
On the night of September 29, 1770, the Reverend John Murray, having fled from England
because he had lost his finances, wife and son, also spent the night praying, because he had
been asked by an illiterate Quaker Universalist, Thomas Potter, to give a sermon in a rustic New
Jersey meetinghouse the next day, Murray didn't want anything to do with it. But he, too, found
the strength to go on, being assured that, as the scripture says, what he needed to say would be
given to him when he needed it.
I may have the same initials as John Murray, but that's about all. However, I do understand his
resistance to God's will for his life, Like John Murray, I have prayed the prayer of weakness: "0
God, go away and leave me alone,"
But the Hound of Heaven has a persistent way of getting your attention. It usually takes a
two-by-four for me to wake up. But I have awoken, And the most amazing thing of all-I feel myself
being led by a power greater than my own to places I would rather not go, "He leadeth me, He
leadeth me, by His own hand, He leadeth me." Now I finally understand the words of old hymn,
I am not that far from retirement. I could sit quietly and say nothing and collect whatever meager
pension I have. But what kind of a person would I be then? And what kind of people would I be
serving if I believed I had to hide?
"What does it profit a man to gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?" My prayer all week
has been simple:
"0 God, you have brought me this far. I do not believe my work is over. I ask that you bless and
keep me according to your will, and lead me into new life, so that I might be faithful to what light
you have shone me. Amen."
I do not come to argue, I do not come to suggest that you agree with me. I do come only asking
that you hear where I am on my life's journey, If you really know and care for me at all, you will be
glad for me, that after such a long sojourn in the wilderness, I feel at peace.
For most of its journey, our movement has been Christian. Whether Unitarian or Universalist, our
affirmations or covenants were overtly Christian.
The earliest covenant we claim is congregational in polity-the 17th Century Cambridge Platform.
It affirmed our Christian roots. And the earliest Univer-salist covenant, 1790, also affirmed the
same roots. And the last Universalist covenant before merger with the Unitarans in 1961, stated
this:
"We avow our faith in God as Eternal and All-conquering Love, in the spiritual leadership of
Jesus, in the supreme worth of every human personality, in the authority of truth known or to be
known, and in the power of men of good-will and sacrificial spirit to overcome all evil and
progressively establish the Kingdom of God."
That's who we have been for most of our history: Liberal Christians. Yet that Is not our common,
collective identify any longer. Isn't it most telling that one of the publications of the Unitarian
Universalist Christian Fellowship is entitled: "So You Want To Be a Christian, But Your Church
Isn't?" That about says it all. But I don't think it states it as clearly as someone said to me
recently: "You can be anything here except a Christian."
What is it about being a Christian that irks so many of us? Is it because we were wounded by our
own Christian roots? Is it because we think all Christians preach a distorted, rightwing gospel of
disdain toward anyone who does not take the Bible literally or adopt their pet theology? Have we
forgotten our own roots? Can't we marvel at the Sermon on the Mount or the wonderful parables
and stories he told?
A few weeks ago, I sat with a minister of another tradition. He was gay; his congregation was not.
He wasn't telling them about himself because he was afraid of what they might think. "Coming
out" for him was so risky that he had to hide his deepest self. He had to bear the off hand
remarks others made about "queers" and "fags." He and I cried together. A day later, I realized
that I was not only crying for him, but for myself and for this movement. I cried for his pain. I cried
because I realized that I felt the same pain but for a different reason: I, and others like me, some
who have left our movement, felt sad because the Jesus rebuked was not the Jesus we had
found... Jesus, the teacher and healer and activist who taught about the nearness of God in the
holiness of the ordinary-a band of disciples eating together, water and air and fire and nature
and the presence of the Holy in even the most lowly of people.
There is a story told by Rosa Parks, the mother of the civil rights movement. She refused to
move to the back of the bus and take a seat there because of the color of her skin. Years later,
when asked why she reused to move to the back of the bus, Rosa Parks said: "Because I was
tired. "
I don't think she meant "tired" physically. I think she meant "tired" emotionally and spiritually. She
was tired of being forced to sit at the back of a bus. She was tired of being a second class citizen.
In a very real way, I'm "tired," too.
I have always been involved in struggling with the life and teachings of Jesus, only recently have I
opened the closet door to say openly: I am a follower of Jesus.. ..reluctant and hesitant, but clear
that he is calling me by name.
Life is too short to stay hidden or fearful. I owe myself and I owe you and I owe God, more than
my fears and weaknesses. The words my father put in the first Bible he gave me have challenged
me anew:
"In all thy ways, acknowledge Him, and He shall direct thy paths. "
So let me clear and unequivocal. I am trying with all my heart and soul to be a disciple of Jesus.
Heaven knows, I've been everything else.
I am the son in one of Jesus' parables who takes his inheritance and gambles it away in a far-off
country. I am so grateful for a second and third and, maybe last chance. I feel claimed by a
Presence deeper and more loving than I have ever known. If you really knew my life story, you
would rejoice with me now as the father in the parable. You would run out to welcome me home.
I also am one of the workers in the vineyard described in another of Jesus' parables. You
remember the story: A vineyard owner hires workers in three hour shifts. At the end of the day,
everyone is paid the same-no matter how many hours they have worked. The point of the story is
not when you answer the call to ministry, but if you answer it at all. I'm one of the late workers.
But in that upside down kingdom, where the poor in spirit and the meek reign, "the first shall be
last, and the first, last." Jesus had a delightful, ironic, revolutionary ethic.
Francis Thompson, a poet and recovering alcoholic, could have been writing about me in one of
his most loved poems, The Hound of Heaven:
I fled Him down the nights and down the days,
I fled Him down the arches
of the years,
the labyrinthine ways
of my own mind;
and in the midst of tears,
I hid from Him. . . .
I am hiding no longer. I am out of the closet.
I am at peace. I am not afraid.
Amen!
John Morgan is a former Editor, Associate Editor, and Writer for the Herald, currently serving as
the minister of the First Unitarian Universalist Church In Reading, Pennsylvania.
A sermon preached February 9, 2003 by the Reverend John Morgan at the First Unitarian
Universalist Church, Reading, Pa
The "In His Name" is intentional. The communion table in the church I serve has these words
carved along one side. It's this side which has turned away from the congregation. Ironically, the
wood in the table is from Dr. George De Benneville's home, Thomas Potter's chapel in New
Jersey and the Ephrata Cloisters from which Universalist missionaries set out to share the good
news.
This is a very personal sermon. In truth, I wrote it for myself, to be clear about where my life
journey has brought me. I hope I do not sound like the person who talked about himself for a long
time before saying to a friend: "Okay, that's enough about me; let's talk about you. What do you
think of me?"
I want to talk about the fact that I am back to dealing with that Zen-like, Mediterranean peasant
who wandered around the villages talking about the kingdom of God and turning the notion of
being a messiah upside down preaching about nonviolence, questioning religious authorities,
speaking in parables, and otherwise making a nuisance of himself not only to his family and
friends, but finally to the political powers. He was crucified, died, and, according to a few friends,
came back to prove his point about love being stronger than death.
On the night before he died, Jesus met with his disciples at Gethsemane, The earliest Gospel
writer, Mark, says Jesus was fearful and distressed.
He asked his disciples to stay awake with him, but they fell asleep. And Jesus prayed for the
strength to bear whatever came his way, "Thy will, not mine, "was always his deepest prayer.
On the night of September 29, 1770, the Reverend John Murray, having fled from England
because he had lost his finances, wife and son, also spent the night praying, because he had
been asked by an illiterate Quaker Universalist, Thomas Potter, to give a sermon in a rustic New
Jersey meetinghouse the next day, Murray didn't want anything to do with it. But he, too, found
the strength to go on, being assured that, as the scripture says, what he needed to say would be
given to him when he needed it.
I may have the same initials as John Murray, but that's about all. However, I do understand his
resistance to God's will for his life, Like John Murray, I have prayed the prayer of weakness: "0
God, go away and leave me alone,"
But the Hound of Heaven has a persistent way of getting your attention. It usually takes a
two-by-four for me to wake up. But I have awoken, And the most amazing thing of all-I feel myself
being led by a power greater than my own to places I would rather not go, "He leadeth me, He
leadeth me, by His own hand, He leadeth me." Now I finally understand the words of old hymn,
I am not that far from retirement. I could sit quietly and say nothing and collect whatever meager
pension I have. But what kind of a person would I be then? And what kind of people would I be
serving if I believed I had to hide?
"What does it profit a man to gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?" My prayer all week
has been simple:
"0 God, you have brought me this far. I do not believe my work is over. I ask that you bless and
keep me according to your will, and lead me into new life, so that I might be faithful to what light
you have shone me. Amen."
I do not come to argue, I do not come to suggest that you agree with me. I do come only asking
that you hear where I am on my life's journey, If you really know and care for me at all, you will be
glad for me, that after such a long sojourn in the wilderness, I feel at peace.
For most of its journey, our movement has been Christian. Whether Unitarian or Universalist, our
affirmations or covenants were overtly Christian.
The earliest covenant we claim is congregational in polity-the 17th Century Cambridge Platform.
It affirmed our Christian roots. And the earliest Univer-salist covenant, 1790, also affirmed the
same roots. And the last Universalist covenant before merger with the Unitarans in 1961, stated
this:
"We avow our faith in God as Eternal and All-conquering Love, in the spiritual leadership of
Jesus, in the supreme worth of every human personality, in the authority of truth known or to be
known, and in the power of men of good-will and sacrificial spirit to overcome all evil and
progressively establish the Kingdom of God."
That's who we have been for most of our history: Liberal Christians. Yet that Is not our common,
collective identify any longer. Isn't it most telling that one of the publications of the Unitarian
Universalist Christian Fellowship is entitled: "So You Want To Be a Christian, But Your Church
Isn't?" That about says it all. But I don't think it states it as clearly as someone said to me
recently: "You can be anything here except a Christian."
What is it about being a Christian that irks so many of us? Is it because we were wounded by our
own Christian roots? Is it because we think all Christians preach a distorted, rightwing gospel of
disdain toward anyone who does not take the Bible literally or adopt their pet theology? Have we
forgotten our own roots? Can't we marvel at the Sermon on the Mount or the wonderful parables
and stories he told?
A few weeks ago, I sat with a minister of another tradition. He was gay; his congregation was not.
He wasn't telling them about himself because he was afraid of what they might think. "Coming
out" for him was so risky that he had to hide his deepest self. He had to bear the off hand
remarks others made about "queers" and "fags." He and I cried together. A day later, I realized
that I was not only crying for him, but for myself and for this movement. I cried for his pain. I cried
because I realized that I felt the same pain but for a different reason: I, and others like me, some
who have left our movement, felt sad because the Jesus rebuked was not the Jesus we had
found... Jesus, the teacher and healer and activist who taught about the nearness of God in the
holiness of the ordinary-a band of disciples eating together, water and air and fire and nature
and the presence of the Holy in even the most lowly of people.
There is a story told by Rosa Parks, the mother of the civil rights movement. She refused to
move to the back of the bus and take a seat there because of the color of her skin. Years later,
when asked why she reused to move to the back of the bus, Rosa Parks said: "Because I was
tired. "
I don't think she meant "tired" physically. I think she meant "tired" emotionally and spiritually. She
was tired of being forced to sit at the back of a bus. She was tired of being a second class citizen.
In a very real way, I'm "tired," too.
I have always been involved in struggling with the life and teachings of Jesus, only recently have I
opened the closet door to say openly: I am a follower of Jesus.. ..reluctant and hesitant, but clear
that he is calling me by name.
Life is too short to stay hidden or fearful. I owe myself and I owe you and I owe God, more than
my fears and weaknesses. The words my father put in the first Bible he gave me have challenged
me anew:
"In all thy ways, acknowledge Him, and He shall direct thy paths. "
So let me clear and unequivocal. I am trying with all my heart and soul to be a disciple of Jesus.
Heaven knows, I've been everything else.
I am the son in one of Jesus' parables who takes his inheritance and gambles it away in a far-off
country. I am so grateful for a second and third and, maybe last chance. I feel claimed by a
Presence deeper and more loving than I have ever known. If you really knew my life story, you
would rejoice with me now as the father in the parable. You would run out to welcome me home.
I also am one of the workers in the vineyard described in another of Jesus' parables. You
remember the story: A vineyard owner hires workers in three hour shifts. At the end of the day,
everyone is paid the same-no matter how many hours they have worked. The point of the story is
not when you answer the call to ministry, but if you answer it at all. I'm one of the late workers.
But in that upside down kingdom, where the poor in spirit and the meek reign, "the first shall be
last, and the first, last." Jesus had a delightful, ironic, revolutionary ethic.
Francis Thompson, a poet and recovering alcoholic, could have been writing about me in one of
his most loved poems, The Hound of Heaven:
I fled Him down the nights and down the days,
I fled Him down the arches
of the years,
the labyrinthine ways
of my own mind;
and in the midst of tears,
I hid from Him. . . .
I am hiding no longer. I am out of the closet.
I am at peace. I am not afraid.
Amen!
John Morgan is a former Editor, Associate Editor, and Writer for the Herald, currently serving as
the minister of the First Unitarian Universalist Church In Reading, Pennsylvania.
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