Everything You Need to Know
Rev. Mark Schaefer
Kay Spiritual Life Center
May 6, 2011—Baccalaureate
Deteronomy 6:4-9
Deuteronomy 6:4-9 Hear, O Israel: The LORD is our God, the LORD alone. 5 You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your might. 6 Keep these words that I am commanding you today in your heart. 7 Recite them to your children and talk about them when you are at home and when you are away, when you lie down and when you rise. 8 Bind them as a sign on your hand, fix them as an emblem on your forehead, 9 and write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.
I. BEGINNING
So.
You’re done. Finished. The work is complete. The strife is o’er, the battle done.
Did you get everything you came for? Are you educated now? I suppose that in reality those are two separate questions. Because there is no doubt that you’ve been educated. But the education you got might not have been the same thing you came here looking for. What you have taken away from this time was likely not what you were expecting to.
No, I suspect you got a different education from the one you were expecting. Many of you as freshmen may not have imagined that you needed to learn anything in the first place. As seniors, you may not feel that you did learn anything. At least, you’re having a harder time than you would have thought remembering what it is you’ve learned. But you have received an education all the same.
II. AN OLD SERMON
Four years ago, I preached a sermon on the text from Deuteronomy we heard read a few minutes ago. It was the first sermon I ever preached to the Class of 2011. I won’t check to see if anyone here remembers that sermon, or was even present, or if you were present, if you ever came back after that. (For those of you putting on appearances for your parents, I promise to act like I know you in the receiving line after the service.)
That sermon from four years ago was entitled “Everything You Need to Know”—a title establishing a somewhat ambitious task for one twenty minute Methodist sermon. Among the tidbits about campus life and D.C. culture that I talked about, I noted that one of the paradoxes of college life is that the more you learn, the less you think you know. I’ve often said that no one knows more than a college freshman (just ask one). By the same token, no one knows less than a college senior (just ask one). So many come into college imagining that they understand the world just fine; they just need more facts to get a job. And then at the end of this process, laden down with facts and new theories and perspectives, they come to realize they don’t understand the world nearly as well as they thought they had when they started out.
I told those gathered there that Sunday that that would even apply to what you believed (or thought you believed). And that if you manage to finish college with the exact same opinions that you came into it with then you haven’t done it right.
And so, given all that uncertainty. Given that the more we learn the less we know, is there anything that we can hold on to? Is there indeed anything that we can know with certainty?
III. WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW
In that sermon from four years ago, I said that what I thought you needed to know about the most was love. Love of God and love in community. Of course, my aim at that time was simple. You were about to embark upon a new, exciting, but somewhat frightening journey and I wanted you to know that you had a safe place here at Kay to wrestle with difficult questions and a community of love and support that would help get you through.
So, what should I tell you tonight as you embark upon another new, exciting, but somewhat frightening journey? What do you need to know at this moment?
Actually, the answer is still the same: love.
Now, I realize that love sounds like one of those warm and fuzzy words that people like to throw around. And right now, facing the challenge of grad school or finding a job or moving to a new city you’re not looking for warm and fuzzy. You’re looking for something real. Something practical. Something that will pay the bills.
You don’t have time for all this love nonsense. It sounds so… well, Christian. Or hippie. Sometimes people get those confused. But it doesn’t sound like the kind of cold hard practical advice that you may feel you need at this stage of the game.
IV. LOVE GOD AND NEIGHBOR
In the text from Deuteronomy is found the great Hebrew confession of faith known as the Shema:
Shema Yisrael… Hear, O Israel, the Lord is our God, the Lord alone. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your might….”
In the Jewish tradition this is the great statement of faith in Israel’s God. In the Christian tradition, this forms the first half of the Great Commandment to love God and to love your neighbor as yourself. And so, we come to understand that love is a pretty important thing in those traditions. But perhaps it’s important to stop and ask what we mean by love.
Contrary to popular opinion and greeting card companies, love is not an emotion. It is not something we feel. It is something we do. It is a way of living and of living in right relationship. When we are called to love God and to love one another, it has nothing about how we might feel about the matter. We can dislike someone immensely and still like them. This we do by being in right relationship.
But love is also something else. Love is a willingness to be vulnerable. It is a relinquishing of control. The traditions of the Jewish people and of the Church present us with a God who is not dispassionate and removed, but with a God who loves. And who, through loving, has become vulnerable. A God who creates the universe out of love. A God who feels sorrow at the tragedies that befall humanity. A God who knows the sufferings of God’s people in bondage in Egypt. A God who laments at the destruction of Jerusalem. And in the Christian tradition, a God who loves us so much as to take up our suffering even to death. Love is about letting go. It is about giving up control. It is about willingly making ourselves vulnerable.
That is love. That is what you need to know.
For there will be a temptation to go out into the world and control as much as you can. To seize advantage wherever you can; to be the master of your own fate and destiny. To seek to schedule and plan and design and master the events of your life. (Let me tell you a little secret, by the way, graduates—parents don’t pay attention to this—those of us on this side of graduation, the ones you think have it all together, are often making it up as we go along. We haven’t necessarily planned our lives out. I mean, I used to be a lawyer.) But you will be tempted to try to plan everything out, to make a plan for your entire lives.
Let go.
When you engage with the world out of love you open yourself up to new possibilities. You open yourself up to learn, to really learn. You make yourself receptive to authentic relationship, by letting people in. You create the promise of genuine community by making yourself available to others. You allow yourself to take risks. To take chances. To experience wonders that you might never have imagined for yourself and which might never come to you if you are more concerned with control and predictability.
Oh, sure, there is risk. You can get heartbroken. You can be disappointed. You can chose the wrong path for a time. But here’s the secret: we can’t actually prevent misfortune and fickle circumstance anyway. When we’re open to the world in love we at least have the hope of something more. Of some possibility beyond a cold, hard, cynical life.
This is not a call to abandon planning or reasonable precautions and practicalities. Don’t worry, parents, I am not suggesting they drop everything and move to Sub-Saharan Africa. There will be plenty of need for having a good head on your shoulders and being responsible.
But life will have a far deeper meaning, a far greater purpose if that life is lived governed by love and an open and willing heart.
V. END
We live in a world overrun by fear. There are many voices clamoring to frighten you for all manner of purposes. Some want you to buy things. Some want your votes. Some want your obedient service or some other behavior from you.
And fear begets so much suffering. Fear of the other begets racism, sexism, homophobia, sectarianism, and many other bigotries. Fear of change often leads to repression and violence. Fear of loss leads to domineering relationships and individuals seeking to control one another. Fear of death leads to desire to control every aspect of one’s life, and often the people in it.
You are the antidote to this poison of fear. And as the song says: all you need is love (love is all you need). For inasmuch as fear begets all that is wrong with the world, love begets all that is good: openness, mercy, compassion, justice, and genuine relationship and community.
In spite of all the doubts about what you have mastered, you have in fact learned much. You have grown in understandings of who you are and come to understand what’s really important. You have come to understand the importance of community, giving of self, and standing up for others who have no voice.
And you are heading out into a world that needs you. A world in which civility and community are damaged. A world in which justice is denied to so many. A world hurting and in need of help. A world longing for people to demonstrate the love, fellowship, and grace that you have come to know.
You are ready for the work. You are up to the task. You are the ones we’ve been waiting for. The ones you’ve been waiting for. You are the salt of the earth. You are the light of the world. Sent out into a world overrun by fear and brokenness. A world in which people imagine they possess all kinds of knowledge but are lacking in knowledge of the one thing that can actually transform communities and give hope to the world: love.
That love is something you have. It is something you can model to the world. That love is something you know. And in the end, that love is everything you need to know.
