September 16, 2007

Rev. Arthur Lavoie

READING

The concept of covenant runs through biblical traditions like a crimson thread.  It is a concept that is often described as the basis of communal relations.  It offers a way to respond and relate to the Ultimate Reality, [or God].  The covenant code in Exodus provides the basis for understanding Old Testament ethics.  It emphasizes the rights of individuals to life, to wholeness, and to the ownership of property.  It also underscores the need to protect marginalized people in the community: slaves, women, orphans, and the poor.  In fact, the covenant code offers an egalitarian perspective that protects individuals and the society.  It boldly levels all distinctions between classes of people.  It is an affirmation of mutual concerns and the common welfare.  Yet this sacred code rests on both condition and promise.  If the people are obedient to God and keep [the] covenant, [they shall be richly blessed]. . . .

This covenant code has tremendous implication for the liberation of the oppressed, communal wholeness, and it is filled with prophetic poignancy.  The covenant code highlights the concepts of responsible faithfulness, abiding trust, and the reciprocity of responsibilities and duties.               Dr. Akintunde E. Akinade, “On Sacred Trust,” The Living Pulpit, Vol. 14 No. 3

READING

“Every denomination must have some way of understanding itself, some notion of what gives it its special identity.  For Presbyterians it has been the Westminster Confession; for Episcopalians it was, at least until recent revisions, the Book of Common Prayer.  For churches like ours, it is the covenant—not the words of any particular covenant, but the covenant relationship of mutual obligation.  But unlike the Westminster Confession, which is an historic document, or the prayer book, which does not get revised very often, the congregational covenant must be renewed continuously.  That means inevitably that there is a special intensity in the search for consensus.  Congregational polity allows and encourages people of varied perspectives to come together; but it also requires them to find some essential basis for agreement if they are to stay together.  There is not assurance that that will happen.  Every time a new member joins a Unitarian Universalist church, the perspectives that must be accommodated are at least marginally affected.  No wonder refugees from our congregations sometimes prefer churches of other traditions where the search for consensus is less demanding.”

Conrad Wright, Walking Together, Polity and Participation in Unitarian Universalist Churches, Skinner House Books, 1989, pg 32-33

SERMON

It was a dark, cold, winter night, a Thursday night in 1637.  There were 30 families that had recently settled in an area southwest of Boston that the Massachusetts General Court had named, “Dedham.”  They were all recent immigrants, among the 20,000 people who fled England during the decade between 1630 and 1640 in pursuit of religious, civic, and political freedom.  Perhaps some of them had originally settled here in Dorchester.

Over the past year they had established their farms and planted and harvested their crops.  Now it was time to found their church, which would be the center of their community, just as the church was the center of this community and all of these early New England communities.  

But it was not possible to just build a building and call a minister and start holding services.  All of these early puritan churches were free and independent churches, organized as covenantal communities, groups of people freely choosing to join together under certain covenantal principles. 

And this group of people that settled in Dedham realized that they did not know each other well enough.  They could not be a covenantal church community without knowing who they were and what were the deepest loyalties that commanded their hearts and souls.

So they gathered, rotating among their different homes, every Thursday evening for nearly a year, in their words, “lovingly to discourse and consult together . . . and prepare for spiritual communion in a church society, that we might be further acquainted with the (spiritual) tempers and guifts of one an other.”

They would always decide before leaving each meeting what question would be discussed the next week so that they would have time to reflect on the issue at hand.  The person hosting the meeting was always given the opportunity to speak first.  Everyone spoke to the question at hand out of their own “understanding and doubt” and arguing was not tolerated.

The questions that they discussed were not always what we today would consider to be religious questions, or questions of belief.  Their meetings began with discussions about what it means to be a community, in their words again, “For the subject of thes disputes or conferences (and) divers meetings att first were spent about questions as pertayned to the just, peaceable & comfortable proceedings in the civill society.” 

Seven years earlier a group of people had gathered in England under the leadership of the Rev. John White to form a covenantal community.  In March of 1630, these families all got on a ship together and set sail, with covenant in hand and church community established, to found this church and this community of Dorchester. 

I am not aware if they, like the people in Dedham, kept such detailed records of their deliberations, but I imagine that there were some similar discussions about the “just, peaceable, and comfortable proceedings in the civill society.”  Or, to put it another way, they drew up a covenant that identified how they would be in relationship with each other, not only in their church but also in the larger community.

And, the group that founded Dorchester was not the only group to sail in 1630.  There was also a group of ships that sailed from another part of England, whose occupants founded Boston and then Watertown in that same year.  John Winthrop, the first governor of Massachusetts, upon arriving on these shores with that group gave a stirring sermon to all who sailed with him which included these words:

“Now the only way to avoid this shipwreck and to provide for our posterity is to follow the counsel of Micah: to do justly, to love mercy, to walk humbly with our God. For this end, we must be knit together in this work as one man. We must entertain each other in brotherly affection; we must be willing to abridge ourselves of our superfluities, for the supply of others’ necessities; we must uphold a familiar commerce together in all meekness, gentleness, patience and liberality.

We must delight in each other, make others’ conditions our own, rejoice together, mourn together, labor and suffer together: always having before our eyes our commission and community in the work, our community as members of the same body. So shall we keep the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace, the Lord will be our God and delight to dwell among us, as His own people, and will command a blessing upon us in all our ways, so that we shall see much more of His wisdom, power, goodness, and truth than formerly we have been acquainted with.”

John Winthrop, A Model of Christian Charity, (sermon given on board the ship Arbella, 1630)

Whatever disparaging comments we might make about our early puritan ancestors, we have to give them credit, for they understood, often better than we do today, that a free church needs to be one that is organized, not around a creed or collection of shared beliefs, but around a covenant, the set of values and principles that define the relationships that people have with each other.

Our covenant, any covenant is a sacred promise or commitment.  It is the foundational element for all relationships, with the individual and his or her God, or highest ideas, between individuals; as in a committed relationship, between the individuals and the community, and among different communities. 

In the three Abrahamic religious traditions; Judaism, Christianity and Islam, all relationships with God and among people are built around covenant.  God makes covenants with Adam and Eve, Noah, Abraham, Moses, Jesus, Mohammed and all of the prophets, leaders and teachers. 

In each of the covenants God promises certain gifts, power, protection and/or authority to those who enter into the covenant.  Those who make the covenant are also bound to act according to the covenant’s provisions.

The important thing to remember here whatever our theology is that covenant does not begin with us.  Covenant begins with a spiritual force outside of ourselves, which many know as God.  Or, to phrase it another way, covenant begins with our experience of being loved and proceeds from our call to love in return.

Our covenant making is our response to love as we have known it, love that is both divine and human, love that is within us and also transcends our deepest imaginings.  Covenant then, is our commitment to live our lives in a way that mirrors the depths of love that we have experienced.

Covenant is more a practice than a verbal agreement.  It is how we live our lives more than any vows or verbal commitments that we make.  The Rev. Dr. Rebecca Parker puts it this way.  “Covenant is brought into being by grace and sustained by practice.”

Rebecca Parker, “What They Dreamed Be Ours to Do: Lessons from the History of Covenant,” p 9

Richard Mather, minister of this church from 1636-1669, whose name graces the school behind wrote:  covenant “may be implied by  . . . constant and frequent acts of communion performed by a company of saints joined together by cohabitation in towns and villages . . . the falling of their spirits into communion in things spiritual . . .”

“The falling of their spirits,” the surrendering of our spirits “into communion” with each other in full participation in the spiritual life of the community.

The “Congregational Affirmation” that we recite here on Sunday mornings is the explicit form of covenant that we use.  And our covenant here is practiced more implicitly in every act of kindness, every giving of ourselves, every moment of deep listening, even when we are upset and angry even when the person we are listening to is not our favorite person.

What are other ways we implicitly live covenant in our daily lives?

Now covenants are great things.  But we are human beings after all, and we have a tendency to break every covenant we have ever written.  “Why should we even bother talking about covenants,” some might ask, “let along write them?”

Why should we bother giving our time and energy to a community that will, perhaps, fail us?  Why should we even think of giving our hearts, in marriage or otherwise, to someone who will disappoint us, someone who will hurt us?

 “The path to deeper spirituality,” writes the Rev. Dr. Rebecca Parker, “begins in the experience of promises failed, covenant broken, hope suppressed.  It begins with disillusionment, impasse and grief.  And it passes through the fire to a new revelation.  This,” she concludes, “is the path we need to follow to find a new heart.”

Rebecca Parker, “What They Dreamed Be Ours to Do: Lessons from the History of Covenant,” p 16

That seems counterintuitive and almost ludicrous  “The path to deeper spirituality begins . . . with disillusionment, impasse and grief.”

But let’s think about that for a minute.  I don’t know about you, but whenever I have worked through issues of disappointment, hurt and loss, either on my own or with the people who have engendered those feelings, I have become a better person, I have attained a more whole sense of myself, and a deeper understanding of the life of my spirit.

Yes, promises are broken and hopes are dashed on the rocks of selfishness, indifference, and greed.  And as human beings we are called to heal our wounds and continue on.  We are called to use often and with great humility the five magic words from our story this morning; “I’m sorry,” and “I forgive you.”

I would disagree with Rebecca if she is saying that pain and sorrow are the only way to achieve a deeper spirituality.  I believe this can also happen in joyful, loving and life-giving times shared.  But we will always have those 5 words, hard though they may be, to bring healing and deeper understanding at times of pain and loss.

Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year was celebrated on Thursday and next weekend will by Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement.  These comprise the Jewish High Holy Days and happen around this time every year.

This is the time of year when those who practice the Jewish faith examine and reflect on their lives and make amends for the ways they have broken covenant with God and with each other.  This is the time not only of deep reflection, but also of renewal of the bonds that bring us together in loving relationship.

And so we make promises, reach for higher ideals, strive to be better, because the importance of being in community, the value of being loved far outweighs anything else we might experience.

Janet Bush, our ministerial intern, in her October UpLook article writes:

“Here we have a chance to share with others our hopes and fears and our best and not so best selves, a chance to grow, to serve, and be served.  Here we join in communion and community with those present today and those who have come before us.  For me, church is a strange and wonderful experiment in shared responsibility for each other and our wider world.  An experiment that is full of joy and, at times, struggle.  A worthy adventure that can bless us all.”

AMEN,

BLESSED BE

BENEDICTION

            May I give you a word of courage,

            Of hope, a story of truth and good.

            Would you give me a word of love,

            Of warmth and consolation.

            May I give you a word of charity,

            A gift to take with you today.

            Would you give me a word of challenge,

            To bring me out of my complacency,

            May I give you a word of hope,

            To raise your spirit out if its low places,

            Would you give me a word of faith,

            To carry me through to the end.

            May our words give form to the

            Promise we hold with one another.

May I Give You A Word, Rev. Carolyn Brown