Sermon given by Rev. Frank Clarkson, September 29, 2024.

That’s a great old hymn we just sang: “O God our help in ages past, our hope for years to come.” I love how it addresses the transitory nature of human life: “Time, like an ever-rolling stream, soon bears us all away.” And how it assures us that, in the midst of change and loss, the presence of God remains: “A thousand ages in thy sight are like an evening gone.” 

Or as Whittier put it: “The letter fails, the systems fall, and every symbol wanes; the Spirit overseeing all, Eternal Love, remains.” Apparently, change and impermanence are near to my heart these days. Maybe to yours too? We are in this season now that reminds us that what has been is going to fall away.

There’s a prayer that’s been coming to my mind: “Be present, O merciful God… so that we who are wearied by the changes and chances of this life may rest in your eternal changelessness.” 

We could talk about whether God changes. It can certainly be comforting to think there is a spirit of eternal and abiding Love that stays the same. But there are these lines from another hymn, which offers a diversity of ways to imagine the divine, including this one:

Young, growing God, eager still to know,
willing to be changed by what you’ve started…

If you ever want to talk about this, I’d welcome the conversation. I’d love it, actually.
In this month when we’re reflecting on seasons, I feel compelled to say something about this election season that we’re in the middle of. First, the obvious: that for we who believe in freedom and in democracy and in justice for all, it is a stressful time. An anxious time. And I hope, a hopeful time. Even a joyful time. 

I’ve always tried to avoid partisan politics in church. I’ve believed that people can have different perspectives and vote different ways and still be sincere about choosing the leader they think is best. That’s the way our system has worked, in normal times. But do I need to say that these are not normal times? One of the nominees for President shamelessly invokes racist and misogynist and anti-immigrant tropes and untruths to rile up his supporters. To encourage the worst in our people. He has invoked and invited violence against those who appear, on the surface, to be different from White America. My prayer for our country is that we will reject and never again repeat the sins of our past; that we will move beyond our prejudices into a better and brighter future, one that embraces the increasing diversity that is 21st century America. So that we can help to heal the wounds so many have suffered, and become a force for more good in this land, and in our world, which is sorely needed these days.

If you’re feeling stressed in this season, please know that you’re not alone! Please take care of yourself, do what you need to do to remain grounded. Ask for help if you need it, and as you’re able, give your hands to the struggle for goodness in whatever way you can. Take up a way to serve—that will bring you purpose and companions, and you’ll have less energy for worrying!

In the Jewish tradition there’s a saying, that in every generation a pharaoh will arise to destroy, and in every generation, every human being must strive to go forth to freedom. We are part of an ongoing and never-ending struggle, for liberty and justice and goodness. And it’s hard to see beyond our own time, we can’t know what lies ahead. So we have to hope, and take heart. And let the faith of our Unitarian forebear, the abolitionist minister Theodore Parker, from a sermon way back in 1853, ring in our ears and abide in our hearts and stiffen our spines:

“I do not pretend to understand the moral universe. The arc is a long one. My eye reaches but little ways. I cannot calculate the curve and complete the figure by experience of sight. I can divine it by conscience. And from what I see I am sure it bends toward justice.”

We are part of overlapping circles of time and connection, and also part of larger and longer arc whose purpose and meaning we can only catch glimpses of from time to time. But can’t we take heart, and take courage, that the long arc is bending, and that it is bending toward justice? And that we are here to be part of shaping and bending that arc, in every way we can. 

These days when we’ve been thinking about seasons, images of circles and ovals have been coming to mind. How a year is one lap around the sun. How the arc of the sun seems to move from higher and lower in the sky as our earth tilts on its axis. How the cycle of the seasons—spring, summer, fall and winter—parallel the stages of our lives, from birth to youth to adulthood to old age and death. 

I think back on when I was in middle school, and I ran track, and sometimes I picture that oval, and the laps we ran around it, and I wonder, “If my life is one lap around that track, where am I? How far around? How close is the finish line?”

The Hindu tradition has a way of understanding human life that divides a lifetime into four stages. The first is childhood and youth, being a student, learning and becoming. Like plants in spring, when everything is new and tender and in bud. 

The second phase, which comes with adulthood, is called the householder phase. It’s the time of work and and family commitments, a busy and productive time, like the season of summer, when everything is growing: abundant and fruitful. 

At some point we start to slow down, and step back from work. Children, if we have them, are grown and leading their own lives. It’s a time to hand your responsibilities to the next generation, and allow them to lead. This is is called the forest dweller stage, and as the name implies, it’s a time for letting go, like the leaves in fall, a time for depth spiritual growth and depth.

The final stage is the big letting of preparing for your own death. Becoming like the trees in winter; stark, solitary, and beautiful. 

I heard someone observe that you don’t become a guru while you’re in the householder phase, you’re occupied with too many things to sit still, crosslegged on the floor! There’s a natural way of living in each stage of life, with its gifts and limitations. And the invitation is to live into each stage as fully as you can. Because time is forever moving on, as it does, and as they say, this, too, shall pass. Sooner than we think. 

Being mindful of this, the transitory nature of life, can help us to love and appreciate whatever stage we’re currently in; to try to love and be awake to this moment, even when it’s hard or sad or discouraging. Whatever the season, the invitation is to be in it, while it’s here. So you don’t look back later with regret.

Do you know the Greek word kairos? The ancient Greeks had two words for time. Chronos is time measured on a clock, in minutes and hours; it’s what we usually think of when we think of time. Kairos is more of an idea; it’s the good or right time for a particular action or effort. The admonition to seize the moment or the day is about kairos—this is the opportune time, so do it! When Martin Luther King wrote, in his letter from the Birmingham jail, “the time is always ripe to do right,” he was talking about kairos time. Chronos is human time; kairos is God’s time. 

Here’s the question: what are we going to do, who are we going to be, in this kairos moment?

We have been given these lives, with seasons that lead from one to another. That begin in childhood and youth, with such possibility and vulnerability: ”Fearful when the sky was full of thunder, and tearful at the falling of a star.” (Joni Mitchell, “The Circle Game”)

Then how quickly the child becomes an adult, and is busy and productive, stretched between a million things.

And before you know it, it’s time to be slowing down; handing off your work and responsibilities to a younger generation.

And finally, to come to the end of life, and let go, as others love you out of this world.

The seasons, they go round and round; we are part of this dance of love and connection, this circle game, for only a short time on this earth. So let us live with that knowledge, and let it give us purpose, and even joy,

Now and forever, 

Amen