"Renewing our Spirits"

Deuteronomy 5:12-15

II Corinthians 3:1-6

A Sermon preached by the Rev. Douglas M. Donley

April 30, 2006

University Baptist Church

Minneapolis, MN

A little over a year ago, the Pastoral Relations Committee, realizing that a Pastoral Sabbatical was scheduled for the Spring of 2006, got to work polling the congregation and dreaming about what we might need to do during the Sabbatical experience. This was facilitated by a grant proposal that was due way back last June to fund our wildest dreams. While we didn’t get the money, we found out what we needed.

We decided we needed opportunities to renew our Spirits. We chose those words intentionally. We didn’t choose to renew our Spirit. That would be too focused upon our own collective need more than our individual needs. We need to renew our Spirits in the plural, remembering that what might renew one person’s Spirit might suck another one’s Spirit dry. So we need to find ways that we can renew all of our Spirits, so that our very best can be available to God to use in previously unimagined ways. As we find each find our own niches to renew our individual spirits, our collective Spirit will be renewed.

Renewal of Spirits in a nutshell is doing something that makes your heart soar. It means doing something that when you’re doing it, the time seems to fly right by. Can you think of what that is for you? For me it is playing or singing the music that stirs my soul. I can also get like that when I’m in the wilderness or tending a campfire. The time meditatively just flies right on by. Lately, I have found some of that while being involved in Bible studies, like the one that meets on Sunday evenings. The discussion and the spirit challenge and totally engage me.

What renews your Spirit?

I remember when I first got involved in Soulforce’s methods of nonviolence. They said that the two goals of nonviolence are first and foremost, your individual spiritual renewal. The second goal is the transformation of society. We have no business changing the world unless we have been so changed that we can focus on love, purpose and the vision of God. That renewed spirit will give us the staying power when faced with defeat.

Cornel West addressed this in his essay entitled "Prisoners of Hope":

Renewing spirits is subversive work. So much of our world is focused on sucking our spirits dry. People with renewed spirits can change the world for the better.

So it is with this commitment to our individual and collective Spiritual renewal that we embark on this sabbatical time just a few short hours away from now. We find ourselves poised to really begin something exciting.

And yet, we have already been renewed, have we not? We are being renewed, are we not? We will be renewed, will we not?

The concept of a Sabbatical comes from the Hebrew term for Sabbath—Shaboath. God said in the wilderness that on the seventh day, we should rest, we should worship, we should remember from whence we came and try to recommit to where we are going.

The Sabbath was instituted so that we could gain perspective, so we could reestablish the balance so desperately needed in our lives.

How have your Sabbaths been going? Do you take a day in the week or even in the month to lie fallow and absorb instead of rushing to and fro from this vitally important function to that meeting, to this class? We seldom do this. We have taken the Protestant work ethic to the extreme and burnt ourselves out by doing good.

In order to do good, we need a Sabbath.

I have been a minister for coming on 17 years now and this will be my first Sabbatical experience. I thank UBC for the foresight and commitment to physical, spiritual and emotional health that is facilitated so well by a Sabbatical. While I’m physically away from you for the next 12 weeks, I will be with you in prayer and spirit.

I will sing Sacred Harp music in hills of Alabama. I will attend a songwriter’s workshop in the plains of Iowa and try to write some music. I will visit the desert southwest, spend a day with a traditional Navajo medicine man, visit and study the center of Anasazi spirituality, Chaco Canyon. I will hike in the Colorado rockies. I will spend intensive time with my family freed from church responsibilities. I will even attempt to run a marathon. I hope to return rested, rejuvenated, inspired and sensitive to the cycles of my life and the life of our community of faith. Through it all, I will be connected with you in prayer.

But why wait for a Sabbatical to renew our spirits? UBC is already renewed and renewing in Spirit. The Lenten liturgical drama conceived and performed by so many people here at UBC has renewed our spirits in that it has let us continually look at new scholarship. We have bravely trod where few Baptist churches dare to trod. We have embraced the feminine and wondered what that means for us as a people. The questions that this raises renews so many of our spirits.

The decision that we made this past weekend about our Regional affiliation has put to bed a lingering painful wound within our congregation as we have sought to live with integrity in a region whose leadership does not honor our unique ministry. As painful as it was to make the decision to leave, it was clearly more painful to stay in an unhealthy situation. Amidst the tears last Sunday, there was a tremendous feeling of relief. In the aftermath of our congregational vote, we now open up new opportunities for growth as a spiritual community without being bogged down with the apologetics of remaining in a region where some of us are deemed unworthy. I look forward to being welcomed into the Rochester-Genesee Region, possibly during the twelve weeks that I am gone.

We are renewing ourselves by the fact that we are going to hear from our own people during these next twelve weeks. The Fire in the Bones Ministry team has scheduled fine preachers from among us who are itching to have their say and preach the word. I’m really sorry I’m going to miss this part of the spiritual renewal. I hope I get a chance to taste the preaching passion of a number of you even after I return.

Last night’s Cabaret was a delight. It’s so good to laugh, sing and celebrate together. My Spirit is renewed. It’s good to show our talent, to hear the voices of young and old, to say thank you to Don Dresser, to Anne Supplee and to have a bit of fun in the process.

Who says that we need to wait for a Sabbatical to start in order to renew our Spirits?

The renewing of our Spirits needs to be a continual ongoing discipline.

The apostle Paul spoke about the Spirit of God washing over him and that such a Spirit is the life-blood of renewal.

I anticipate our reunion in late July and I imagine all of us renewed. I imagine the time flying by. I imagine you saying, "oh, you’re back already? It was just getting fun." When your Spirit is renewed, time flies by.

I feel confident leaving you for these twelve weeks. The Council can handle the budget. After the meetings we have been through this Spring, our own annual meeting will be a breeze, filled with more celebration than contention. You will be well cared for in the skilled and compassionate hands of our Sabbatical Interim Pastor, Stephanie Burroughs-Saffold.

So while we’re apart, I challenge you to take a look at yourself. Look at what makes your heart soar. Not sore, soar. Think of those things that you loose yourself in. Think of those things that bring you joy, those things that recharge your battery. I hope and pray that you find some time and opportunity to fill yourself with a good dose of that spirit renewing time.

You will be better for it. We will be better for it. You might well find that your life is in better balance and that you have more strength with which to face the world. And when we see each other again in 12 weeks, I want to hear of your discoveries. I want to hear of your revelations. I want to hear how I or we can help your heart and your spirit continue to soar.

If we can help make our hearts soar, freeing us up to seeing new possibilities instead of continual roadblocks, then who can predict what subversive good news might come from this audacious bunch known as University Baptist Church.

As much as I am looking forward to this Sabbatical, I am even more excited about seeing what you come up with in the coming months to make your hearts soar and hear about how the Spirit of God sets you free to live into the gospel message of peace, joy, love, justice, compassion and mercy.

May God guide all of us in these twelve weeks and beyond. May our Spirits be persistently and consistently renewed. Amen.