The Courage of Faith

“The Courage of Faith”

Luke 19:28-44

First Presbyterian Church of Jamestown , New York

The Reverend Thomas A. Sweet

March 28, 2010

Palm/Passion Sunday

For reasons I cannot really explain, I long have been fascinated by the sign offs of news anchors at the end of their newscasts. Some of you remember Edward R. Murrow and his sign off – “Good night and good luck.” Chet Huntley and David Brinkley concluded their nightly broadcasts with a sign off they personally detested by were required to use by the network, one that brought me comfort whenever I heard it as a boy, as if to hear it meant that everything was all right with the world. Brinkley in Washington would say to Huntley in New York , “Good night, Chet.” And Huntley would reply to Brinkley, “Good night, David. And good night for NBC News.” Walter Cronkite ended his newscasts with the benediction, “That’s the way it is.” Buffalonian Tim Russert at the end of his news shows was known to sneak in a “Go Bills!” But my all time favorite was a sign off that Dan Rather used for only a week in the mid-80s because too many people thought it bizarre and CBS told him to find another one. But I thought it was tremendous. For that singular week, he said, “Thank you for joining us tonight. Courage.” Rather had the last word, though, as on the final night of his twenty-four year career as a CBS anchor, he closed out by saying,

To our soldiers in dangerous places. To those who have endured the

tsunami and to all who have suffered natural disasters, and who must

find the will to rebuild. To the oppressed and to those whose lot it is

to struggle, in financial hardship or in failing health. To my fellow

journalists in places where reporting the truth means risking all. To

each of you: “Courage.”

A decade earlier at the annual meeting of the Radio-Television News Directors Association, in a retrospective of iconic newsman Edward R. Murrow’s life, Rather had said,

What separated Ed Murrow from the rest of the pack was courage.

I know what you’re thinking. I’ve gotten in trouble before for using the

word. Probably deserved it. Maybe I used it inappropriately. Maybe

I’m a poor person to talk about it because I have little myself. But

I want to hear the word. I want to hear it praised, and the men

and women who have courage elevated.

Me, too. Of all the attributes of the faith by which we in this room have pledged ourselves to live, I think the two most important are, and in either order, humility and courage. Jesus had both in abundance and in the right mix which helped to make him the transforming figure that he was and is. Today, I want to talk about courage.

“Courage” comes from the French word coeur which means “heart” – heart as the seat of feeling and thought in us. Literally, courage means to bring something into good heart. Derivative meanings include speaking one’s mind and telling one’s true heart. In that way, courage also has to do with honesty, sincerity, authenticity, and being upfront with oneself and others. A secondary meaning of courage, though it is the one we often mean by it, is bravery, valor, or boldness in the face of fear or threat.

What stands out for me in our Palm Sunday reading (did you notice, by the way, that there is no mention of palms in Luke’s gospel but that people threw their coats and cloaks on the road to honor Jesus? But “Coats and Cloaks Sunday” does not have much of a ring to it, does it?) is the courage of Jesus. Jesus did the good he did and faced the opposition he faced because he had the courage to bring the gospel into good heart, to bring it into the open no matter the cost to himself. He seemed to have the innate sense that almost anything creative goes against or beyond the societal norms of the time – and that is true whether it is art or education or politics – and he was willing to pay the price to bring into the light an alternative reality to the one offered up by the kingdoms of this world.

On the same day that Jesus entered into Jerusalem , in another parade in another part of town, Pontius Pilate rode into the holy city in full imperial glory in order to maintain Roman rule and peace during the Passover celebrations. The Pharisees ordered Jesus to tell his disciples to be quiet because, while the Pharisees chafed under the Roman occupation, they did not want any trouble with Pilate and the occupiers. But Jesus told them that trouble is inevitable wherever there is injustice and greed and “that if these (disciples) were silent, the stones would shout out.” It is like Martin Luther King, Jr. declaring that “the moral arc of the universe is long, but it bends toward justice.” Or like William Sloane Coffin proclaiming, “There is nothing immoral that is smart in the long run.” Jesus wept for Jerusalem because it had not and would not listen to the prophets’ voices or to his and thus they did not know or do the things that make for peace.

Most of you, I am sure, have heard of a man named Jean-Francois Blondin or, as he was called, “The Great Blondin.” He was a French acrobat most famous for crossing the Niagara Falls on a tightrope. But he did not just walk across it. Blondin always was looking for more exciting ways to cross the Falls on the rope that was 1100 feet long, 3 inches wide, and 160 feet above the raging waters, with no net underneath. Sometimes he did it blindfolded. Sometimes he did it on stilts. Sometimes he did it carrying his manager on his back. Once he even sat down halfway across the gorge and cooked himself an omelet on a small stove.

Crowds of people flocked to every one of his shows. Eventually Blondin came up with a new idea for crossing – pushing a wheelbarrow. One day, as the crowds jostled to get a better view, Blondin asked over a loudspeaker, “How many of you believe that I can push this wheelbarrow over the Falls with someone sitting in it?” A collective gasp rose up from the crowd with some of the people raising their hands and shouting, “Do it! Do it!” Blondin moved toward one young man who had held up his hand up and said, “If you believe I can do it, do you have enough faith in me to get into the wheelbarrow yourself and be the person I wheel across?” The young man, in no uncertain terms, quickly recused himself because, obviously, belief is not the same as faith. Belief calls for little personal investment or courage. Faith requires both. Jesus never tried to coerce belief, but urged us all the time to awaken to the power of faith that God gifts to each of us.

The faith of Jesus in God always compels us to ask ourselves whether we have the courage of our faith in God to continue his ministry in our own time.

The movie Braveheart was released almost fifteen years ago but still is played often on cable and is ranked in the Top 100 Movies of all time on the Internet Movie Data Base website. The movie is about the Scottish freedom fighter named William Wallace at the time of King Robert I, otherwise known as Robert the Bruce, and the Scottish struggle to secure its independence from England.* Wallace is a man of incredible character and aptly known as Braveheart for his courage in the face of immense personal cost. The most important part of the film is right near the end where Wallace is being drawn and quartered for his rebellion against the English. He is given an opportunity to recant and once again to pledge his allegiance to the Crown but he chooses instead to face a painful death in the name of freedom rather than to capitulate and back down from his convictions.

There is something very inspiring about courage in whatever form it is found. There is an Italian proverb that says “it is better to live one day as a lion than a hundred years as a sheep.” Our Palm Sunday story shows us the brave-heart, the lion-heart, of Jesus for he knew full well that he was entering a hostile city. The crowds were enthusiastic but beyond the din of its cheers, Jesus knew that he was in the crosshairs of the Jerusalem authorities whose ways Jesus threatened. That being the case, it would have been understandable for Jesus either to turn back or to enter into the city in stealth, perhaps at night or in a more secretive way.

But Jesus entered in the most public way possible and in a manner, on the colt of a donkey, that repudiated the kind of power that pretends to hold sway in the world. He entered with the courage of his faith, bringing it to good heart, to show God’s preferred ways in the world. His entry was itself a parable meant to en-courage us when we are tempted to throw in our lot and to become complicit with the power and powers of this world. There is another way, this parable says, of living in that makes for peace and does whatever love demands.

Like all of scripture, the Palm Sunday story does not want us simply to look back to a time gone by. It really does not matter that much to me what happened on that first Palm Sunday. But I care deeply and passionately about what is happening in our lives as we come to this Palm Sunday. Where do you need to be en-couraged in your life? Where do you need the courage of faith? The gospels point to the living Christ who, as sure as he made a home in Jesus, is here with us today to invigorate our faith if we will and to make it meaningful and relevant and real to us so that our oneness with God and all may be honored by the way we live. Let us not be numbered among those of whom Jesus said, “But you would not.”

Well, that brings us to the end of the newscast. Er, I mean sermon. “Thank you for joining us today. Courage!”

Amen.

*I was told gently after the sermon by someone who would know J that these details are not entirely historically accurate. But they are as the movie portrayed J. That is my defense and I am sticking to it. Thanks, Richard Slater!

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