One Day at a Time
The Rt. Rev. Don E. Johnson
Episcopal Bishop
Diocese of West Tennessee
Memphis, Tennessee

(This sermon is also available in audio.)

When the phone rang at 2:00 a.m. on that last Sunday morning in July of 1996, life as I had had known it was changed forever. In those wee hours of the morning on what was supposed to be my final day as rector at St. John's Church, Johnson City, Tennessee, the call came from my mother in Nashville. She told me that my father had been admitted to hospital with what appeared to be a heart attack. Two and a half months later he was dead. With the clarity of a change of season, my life had been changed. And thus begins our tale for today.

On this day we begin again the ancient penitential season of Lent. Lent is an old English word meaning "springtime," and, beginning with this gathering, we begin what the Reverend Richard Ling has called "a springtime-kind of penance; namely, the softening of the ground, the digging, the plowing down into our souls, so necessary if God's grace is to lead to an Easter fruitfulness."

Lent is the Church's most important season of renewal. But it is not a gentle time to consider at our leisure the significance of God's call for our lives. St. Paul (II Corinthians 6:2) recalled the word of God on the lips of the prophet Isaiah (49:8): "At an acceptable time I have listened to you, and on a day of salvation I have helped you." But Paul then goes on to clarify: "I tell you, now is the time of God's favor, now is the day of salvation."

Lent is a season of urgency mixed with opportunity. This is the season in which we are faced with God's Now and the choice to heed its urgent call … to seize its opportunity… or to let the time pass at our own soul's peril. The editor of Celebration magazine said that his 94 year old father's favorite saying was that we should "Live each day as if it were your last, and some day you will be right." Lent is such a reminder of how we to are to live each of our days.

Lent is a time when we are invited to look within, to look around, and to look ahead. To facilitate that reflection as you consider your resolve around a Lenten discipline, I offer three suggestions.

First, have you ever wanted to write a book? Some of you have already accomplished this. Others of us may still be writers in bud. Part of what I want to share with you today is an invitation with Lenten urgency for you to write your own book… and the topic is "You."

Remember the old TV program This is Your Life? Ralph Edwards was the host, and he would invite people from the guest's past to speak a few words off stage to jar the honoree's memory. Edwards would then ask, "Do you recognize that voice?" Then he would invite the voice from the past to come out and be more fully interviewed.

Well, the book I want you to consider writing is to a first-person perspective on your own voice from the past. I have started my book. I invite you to start yours as well. The planning tool I am using to develop my first-person story is titled, A Father's Legacy,Your Life Story in Your Own Words.

While it was written with fathers in mind, other versions have been developed for others who would like to bequeath a legacy of remembrance to those most close to them. It was the dying and death of my own father, Bubber Johnson, on October 19, 1996, that motivated me to begin my writing.

When Dad died, Mother asked me to officiate at his funeral. They were members at Woodmont Baptist Church where the Rev. Bill Sherman was their distinguished pastor of many years. Bill was gracious enough to let me take the lead in Dad's funeral even to the extent of using the Episcopal Burial Office for the service. I had asked my dearest friend, the Rev. Canon Bob Brodie, to stand with me on the podium. I said, "If I get too choked up, Bob, you just step in and take over." Bob was there for me, and while I didn't have to call on him to step in, I shall appreciate his being literally there by my side until my dying day.

After Dad died, I discovered that his many friends, some of whom I had known since my childhood and others I was only then meeting for the first time, began to share stories about him with me. Soon it became clear how little I knew about my Father. This came as a shock and a blow. I wanted to know this man who had provided and cared for my Mother, two sisters and me so consistently through the years. Yet I came to find that I did not know the man. And now it was too late to hear from him directly. But many of his friends did share stories of my Father with me. It was as a result of these stories that I came to realize that I wanted my children, my wife and my friends, if they would be interested, to hear my story my way.

This is the first invitation I bring to you today. As you consider the Lenten discipline you will take on in this season of urgency and opportunity, I invite you to begin your book about your life as a gift you give to those you will precede into God's nearer presence--your heirs, your children, spouse, friends, the world. "Inquiring minds want to know." And after you and I are gone back to ashes and dust, it will be too late for them to ask us the questions to which they may wish to know our answers.

I bought a copy of the Legacy book the Christmas after Dad's death and I have slowly added to it over the years. I commend it to you as a gift to yourself and to those you love. In A Father's Legacy, simple questions about everyday life are asked. "Describe your childhood home. What was your favorite room?" "What did you enjoy doing most as a child? Did you enjoy doing it most alone or with someone else? "Can you remember being afraid as a boy? What was your greatest fear? How did you deal with it?" "What mischievous prank did you pull on someone? How did it affect you?" "What do you remember about your first kiss?"

Now I don't know about you, but I never would have thought to jot down my experiences as asked for in this guided style of journaling. I can only suggest to you that it is a wonderful opportunity for me to connect with my own past (especially the kissing part) and to provide a window for my children, wife and others to see me through my own eyes when the time comes. But for this to happen we must take seriously the word of Paul who reminds us that "Now is the acceptable time." It is into this Lenten 'Now' that I invite you.

A second suggestion I commend for your Lenten discipline is to choose areas of focus that have at least the potential of deepening your relationship with God, yourself and others. Life is busy enough already and we don't need merely one more darn thing to do.

In this regard, I am reminded of Bishop Fulton Sheen. He once had a speaking engagement in Philadelphia. He left the hotel early to allow time to walk about the city before showing up at the Town Hall for his speech. After a while it became clear to him that he had lost his way. He saw a group of children playing by the side of the road. Approaching them he said, "I am a stranger in your town, and I seem to have lost my way. Can any of you tell me how to get to the Town Hall?" Finally, one young boy volunteered and gave him the directions the Bishop needed. After that the boy asked, "What are you going to do there?" "I'm going to deliver a lecture." "On what?" "On how to get to heaven." "To heaven?" the young boy exclaimed. "You don't even know how to get to the Town Hall."

I suggest that you make an appointment with a person you trust for the purpose of talking about your spiritual life of prayer and devotion. It is incredible how many of us go throughout our lives and are never asked about our life in relationship to the Spirit of God. If asked, people are often more than willing to listen and to share. Not everyone may know how to get to the Town Hall of a strange town. But there are those who do know "how to get to heaven." It may be a clergy or lay person with whom you can share your spiritual journey. Don't wait to be asked. Take the initiative. Candidly state your desire to focus on your spiritual walk with God. Who knows? It may be the only time that person has been given permission to share his or her own spiritual journey as well. But the primary purpose of your meeting is self-awareness and personal growth. You are seeking to better find your way with and toward God.

I'm tempted to say that the best way to not break your Lenten discipline is to not have one. But this is the wimpy way out. It is certainly not the life of adventure to which the Lenten sojourner is called. So my third suggestion is, in addition to encouraging you to write down your past as a legacy story in your own words, I also encourage you to look ahead and decide with the help of others what spiritual strengths you want to develop as you move into that future. Simply put, I am asking you to consider taking on a discipline that will help you in living a life of faithfulness.

My daughter is now in her last semester of law school. But I distinctly remember the quote pinned to the bulletin board in her high school choir rehearsal room. Quoting from the great football coach Vince Lombardi, the admonition read, "Practice doesn't make perfect. Perfect practice makes perfect." I think this is a good guideline for you and me as we consider what disciplines we choose to practice this Lent. The standard is high for Christians: "Be ye perfect." Jesus said this and it cannot be overlooked. But Jesus' perfection was demonstrated in his ability to conform his life to God's desire. This is our goal as well.

At the same time we recognize with St. Paul in his letter to the Church in Rome that "All have sinned and come short of the glory of God." (Romans 3:23). This significant caveat is quickly followed by the promise in chapter 8: "While you were yet sinners, Christ died for us." He didn't wait for us to good or perfect enough. But the high calling to live perfectly conformed to God's desire is still the goal. With God's help (and a lot of starting over), we are able to approach the throne of grace with the confidence of faith. The oft quoted Biblical scholar E. Stanley Jones once said, "Life holds nothing within it which Christ has not conquered." With this promise, we have nothing to fear and much to hope for.

While on retreat years ago at Gethsemane Monastery in Bardstown, Kentucky, I found a prayer penned by the monk Thomas Merton. In it were lines that have opened me not only to hopefulness but also to intentionality in my faith. Copied and framed, it is now part of my spiritual heritage and the foundation of my spiritual hope.

Merton's prayer began,

My Lord God, I have no idea where I am going. I do not see the road ahead of me. I can not know for
certain where it will end. Nor do I really know myself, and the fact that I think I am following your will does not mean that I am actually doing so. But I believe that the desire to please you does in fact please you. And I hope I have that desire in all that I am doing. I hope that I never do anything apart from that desire. And I know that if I do this you will lead me by the right road, though I may know nothing about it. Therefore I will trust you always through I may seem to be lost and in the shadow of death. I will not fear for you will never leave me to face my perils alone.

Life lived in this hope and with this intentionality to "desire to please God" is life lived in confidence and with trust. St. Augustine said the same thing when he taught, "Love God and sin boldly." This was not a commendation of sinning. This was a pledge of confidence in God Who will not abandon me though I sin along life's way. This is a statement of belief that God will lead you and me "by the right path." It is into this pathway that I invite you to walk in this Lenten season of Now.

James Conant, former President of Harvard, had the opportunity to speak to a national group of teachers. Being an educator himself, he eagerly shared with the group the latest methods of educating. Time passes, and it so happened that he was able to address the same group some months later. At that time he discovered that not only were none of the teachers using the methods he had shared with them. None of them could even remember any of them either. Reflecting on this experience, Conant came to the conclusion that what was lacking was an "enabling mechanism" to put what he taught into practice. With the mechanism, there was no practical application.

The evangelist Bob Mumford teaches that there was an Italian harbor known to be dangerous for navigating. There were three light houses located strategically along the watery passage. Wise sailors knew that if they kept the three light houses lined up so that they appeared as only one light, they were in safe water. If they only saw two lighthouses, they had drifted too far out of the safe channel.

To drift too far out of the channel, is what the Greek word "hamarta" means when translated: "to miss the mark" or in Biblical terms, to sin. Missing the mark is neither surprising nor unique. It is what we do after the misaligned effort that makes the difference in a world of faith. What we need are the means to bring us back on target and to carry us forward as safely and as accurately as is possible toward the goal of our safe harbor.

Mumford helpfully identifies the three lighthouses we have been given: (1) the Word of God (our objective standard speaking from without), (2) the Holy Spirit (our subjective witness speaking within), and (3) Circumstances (Divine providence speaking in the moment.) In the season of Lent we too can use these three lighthouses to help us find our way. The enabling mechanism the Church provides for those of us who wish to deepen our resolve and ability to live a faithful life is called our "Rule of Life" or regula.

I conclude this invitation to a Holy Lent by encouraging you to take on the regula as the third part of your Lenten discipline. This can go hand in hand with your appointment to discuss your spiritual journey with that person you trust. It is also a decision that is not inconsistent with the personal journaling experience in which you will be mining your past and recording the legacy you wish to leave for your family and friends. The regula has been compared to a bucket used to carry the water of life from its source to where you need it each day. It is available to help move us from the old life of broken resolutions, disciplines and
human-driven efforts into a new life lived in better balance with God's leadings. The great Christian preacher and author Peter Marshall used to pray, "When I am wrong, dear Lord, make me easy to change, and when I am right, make me easy to live with!"

(And let the people say, "Amen.")

The regula provides for us a starting place for self examination in the light of God's grace. There is not one regula for everyone. However there are certain shared aspects of the regula which can then be tailor-made to our personal temperaments and conditions as people of faith. Radio personality Dave Ramsey says that we should, "Find something you like to do so much that you'd do it for nothing. Then do it so well that someone will be willing to pay you to do it."

This is my invitation to you today as you begin this Lenten Now in renewing relationship to God, others and to yourself. Find your gifts and talents. Find those things that by temperament or training, you find that you like so much that you would do them for nothing. These sources of personal joy are as much if not more a part of your life to be strengthened and affirmed as any seeming spiritual shortcoming you seek to overcome. Don't forget, Gospel means Good News. And there is to be an abiding sense of joy beneath all the work we are called to do in this life for Christ's sake. Do it for nothing, but the rewards will be great. Affirming the joy as well as working on the areas in need of improving won't happen overnight. Our habits are too deeply ingrained. This Lenten Now is a call to a life time adventure of living in faith and in relationship with God. As our friends in A.A. say, we will have to do it "One day at a time."

Jesus, as he moved toward his passion, was said to "set his face toward Jerusalem." This is a reminder to us all: don't plow forward looking back. The wise cowboy comedian Will Rogers said it this way, "Don't let yesterday take up too much of today." Or as my first confessor told me after laying on him a sheaf of sins old and forgotten in the sight of God, "Don, when you come before God with your sins, remember to leave it at the altar." Yesterday is a burden we can lay down. If God isn't carrying it around any more, why should we? Just remember, leave it at the altar. The old saying may be worth bringing out for you at this time: "Whenever things sound easy, it turns out there's one part you didn't hear."

Therefore, let me recap:

• Look back, claim and then share the legacy of your life which is yours alone to share in your own words.
• Look ahead and see what gifts and talents God is calling you to share.
• Look around and see what areas of spiritual development you need to strengthen. Then trust God to make up the difference.
• And finally, "Live each day as if it is your last. Some day you will be right."

Copyright 2002 The Rt. Rev. Don E. Johnson