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I love the Presbyterian Historical Society. It’s a hidden gem of a resource. It is a history geek’s paradise, to which I fully confess. It has rooms and rooms filled with documents, books, missionary letters, session minutes. I learned that it will eventually have a file on me, not by virtue of any accomplishment of mine, but by virtue of my expiration, so I am not quite ready for that yet. The most interesting thing I saw this time was a set of Revolutionary Era dueling pistols, worth thousands of dollars. One of my committee colleagues wondered if those might be put to use these days to settle any Presbyterian disputes, and if I remember correctly, no one really protested that suggestion. The minute you walk into the building, you are greeted with portraits –actually portrait after portrait. They have more portraits than wall space, so they rotate them, like a museum, including in staff members’ offices. Many are of people long dead with names not readily remembered. Several are of more well-known Presbyterians – Woodrow Wilson, for example, a famous Presbyterian elder, and John Wanamaker, the famed Philadelphia businessman and Presbyterian philanthropist. All, or most, General Assembly moderators have portraits in the room. I saw people whose names I recognized – the first African-American moderator, the first woman moderator. I saw people I know and remember fondly. It was poignant and inspiring to see all those portraits. It always is, but perhaps more so in the shadow of Reformation Sunday, which we mark today. You will remember that on October 31, 1517, Martin Luther posted 95 theses, or disputes, on a church door in Wittenberg, Germany, thus launching the Protestant Reformation. John Calvin, our Presbyterian theological forbear, took Luther’s ideas to new levels, and many, many followed. This is perhaps my favorite Sunday in the year. In the old days, it was a day when we emphasized how non-Roman Catholic we were. We’ve gotten better since then. It’s a day to remember our heritage, to sing Luther’s and Calvin’s well-known hymns, to think about the ongoing task of reform. That’s why I like it, and that’s the power of the witness of all those portraits. I get the same feeling when I visit our own archives, thumbing through old folders and files of those who have gone before us, old newsletters, session minutes, photographs, especially old capital campaign literature! The past is prologue, it is said, and history teaches us if we pay attention to the present witness of past saints. The Protestant Reformation was about theology and the Bible. Luther insisted that we were saved by grace through faith, and not by works. Indulgences were the issue, the ability of people to “buy” their way into salvation. (The Junior Choir punctuated that idea this morning when they sang: “If religion were a thing that money could buy, the rich would live and the poor would die.”) But it was more than that. It was a new way to think about theology as the people’s conversation. It was a new way to think about the Bible as the people’s book. It was a new way to think about the church as the people’s church. It was a new way to think about leadership. No longer were the leaders the experts, trained in the mysteries of theology and ordained by God to dispense them to an all-too-receptive people. No…to see all those portraits hanging on the walls was a powerful reminder that of all the things the Protestant Reformation was, it was a revolution about leadership, with religious and political consequences. Yes, God still called people to do particular things, but God called all people to a common ministry, what Luther called the “priesthood of all believers.” What that meant in the church was an opening up of power and responsibility. Calvin took it farther, with the concept of elders, church leaders, governing the church, and setting limits around the minister’s authority. John Knox took it even farther in Scotland, leading to what we know today as the Presbyterian way of doing things. It has its moments, as we know. Democracy can be slow and messy. In the negative, it is always better to limit the power of the few. In the positive, it is always better to benefit from the gifts of the many. Politically, the Reformation signaled the beginning of the end of monarchy, the divinely appointed right of those with wealth and power and birthright to rule over those who didn’t. It is no accident that the representative form of government known in the United States and in many other places is formed after the structure of a Presbyterian meeting – leaders elected by the people to represent them. We Presbyterians have fought with the powerful throughout our history, John Knox with Mary, Queen of Scots, John Witherspoon with King George. We envisioned new forms of leadership in church and in politics, so that democracy is not just an interesting way to run things, but a God-inspired way to organize church and government. Those portraits did not represent political or ecclesiastical perfection. What they represented, and represent, is faithfulness. With power in the hands of the people, we don’t rely on our leaders to be perfect, nor do we fall apart when they are less than that. That is what we hear this morning. We hear it in the farewell tribute to Moses at the conclusion of the book of Deuteronomy. Moses – abandoned by his mother in order to be saved. Murderer. Ineffective speaker. Filled with doubt and challenged by those he led to freedom. Yet through it all – called by God, unwavering in his commitment. In the perfect Hollywood ending he would have died in the land to which he led the people, but he did not make it that far. You can see it, God says to him, but you can not cross over. Never since have we known a leader like Moses, we are told. And Paul. He persecuted the early church until God knocked him off his horse and opened his eyes in a new way. When he writes to the Thessalonian church, he is seeking to establish himself. A kind of values-based resume. No deceit. No trickery. No flattering words. “But we were gentle among you, like a nurse tenderly caring for her children.” (This week I cannot imagine either Senator McCain or Obama using the word “gentle” to describe their leadership.) And as we share the gospel with you, Paul continues, we share ourselves, our very selves. Embodied leadership, like Moses, unequaled in his devotion to God, and therefore in his ability to do what God asked. Superheroes, in a sense, not because of their own accomplishments, but because they allowed God’s accomplishments to work through them. That seems to be how God works. Look at David, hardly a model of fidelity. Look at the disciples, whose continuing gospel witness seems to be an incompetent inability to get it, yet through whom Jesus established the church and commissions to take its ministry to the corners of the world. There are many Reformation lessons this morning. Of Moses, James Newsome writes that “the veneration with which Moses is viewed almost causes the reader to forget that Moses, like all people, was a sinner.” (Texts for Preaching, Year A, page 536) This is a fully human tribute we receive. And Paul, too, speaking of his own life in his own words, is honest with his Thessalonian sisters and brothers. He speaks of courage in the face of imprisonment, opposition, suffering and mistreatment. He speaks of integrity. Beverly Gaventa writes of the “utter vulnerability” of the figure of the apostle. He is not authoritative and powerful, but risks humiliation and rejection. What would that kind of leadership look like today?(Pages 540-541) Like Moses, whose own result left him short of the Promised Land, Paul is not concerned by results so much, but the faithfulness of the effort. There are many Reformation lessons. Expect God to call leaders, but do not expect them to be like the leaders the culture raises up. In fact, except them to be average and ordinary – you and me. Expect them to have weaknesses and shortcomings, and expect those shortcomings to be the ways that God’s best work is done. Sinners leading sinners. Have new expectations about leadership. Don’t look to princes or popes or presidents or ministers to have all the answers and to make things OK, but rather look to the people as the way that God makes things happen. Not to put too fine of a point on this, but consider the political matters before us in these days. Consider what we have discussed these past several weeks: that we are ALL values voters, that God alone is Lord of the conscience, that the gospel does have political implications. Consider matters like character and values and temperament. But be thoughtful, not swayed by the emotions and images of TV commercials and blogs. Consider who our leaders will be, what they will be, how they will be. But consider also how we – grateful heirs of the Reformation – are all called to be as leaders. The continuing reformation of the church and the world is never complete, and if we rely on politicians, we will fall short, and if we rely on ministers exclusively for theological vision, we will be disappointed. This is a great legacy of the Reformation. It is messy and complex. It is hard work. It lets none of us off the hook. But we have such extraordinary models – with names like Moses and Paul, and Luther and Calvin, and Knox and Witherspoon, and millions more named and unnamed. And we have great models – look to your right and to you left, if you need a reminder. So that our task, and our goal, is not to do things that get our portraits memorialized on the walls of galleries. Our task, and our goal, is to be as living portraits whose faces reflect in the living walls of the church, of our communities, of those whom we love and those who need love. And we will be remembered by what we do and who we are. And we will be remembered in the heart of God – who calls us – all of us – to do great things, with courage and vulnerability and gentleness. Amen.
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