Saying Yes and Saying No

Tom has always been smart and hardworking.  He made partner in his firm right on schedule, just as he was nearing his tenth wedding anniversary and the kids were turning 6 and 8.  They moved into a bigger house 3 years ago, and have gotten used to some nice vacation spots and paying to get most of the work done around the house.  In order to afford it, Tom keeps signing on for more and more responsibility, even though he gets stuck at the office through most of the kids music activities and sports.  He’s rarely home for dinner and hasn’t been on a date with his spouse in 6 months.  He feels stuck, but its mostly because of the need to sustain a lifestyle he is choosing for himself.

Jen is the consummate super mom with 3 kids, a house to take care of, aging parents and a full time job.  She was mostly keeping it together—though stressed—but then when the pandemic came and there was nothing to do at night, her typical habit of a glass of wine each night turned into 5 times that, and she hasn’t been able to dial it back.  Every day she feels like she’s just barely keeping the wheels from falling off, and she wants to quit, but she hates to appear like there’s anything she can’t handle, so she can’t seem to bring herself to ask for help.

After a long career of driving hard for success, Jim has been feeling spiritually empty and is trying to grow in his relationship with God.  Prayer, meditation, and things like that have always been hard for him because he doesn’t feel like he’s “doing” anything, but lately he’s trying to turn over a new leaf because something about his life just doesn’t seem right, and he wants to figure it out.  When he wakes up early in the morning, he’s got an app he uses for guided meditation, and a devotional journal he uses to try to pray.  He tries for 20 minutes, and most of the time when he makes the commitment, the praying is hard, but the rest of his day is transformed for the better, calming his short temper, making him more attentive to his husband, and helping him to feel some peace.  But this contemplative stuff is brand new for him, and most of the time, the hardest part is sitting down to get started—so he often skips it.

Each of these people are dealing with the challenge of saying yes and saying no—a thing we all have to do every day.  It’s always been like that, and in case these challenges seem new to you, I direct you to Deuteronomy, chapter 30, recorded roughly 3000 years ago.  For some context, Deuteronomy is the fifth book in the Old Testament, the last of the five books of the Law, so before it, you get the stories of the Creation and the Patriarchs in Genesis, then in Exodus the time of captivity in Egypt and release from slavery, and then the people wander in the Wilderness for 40 years seeking the Promised Land, and during this time God gives them the Law.

A common question—one worth asking—is why the Hebrews had to wander in the Wilderness for such a long time.  If God loved them so much, why not just tell them how to get to the Promised Land?  Well, the answer the theologians usually give is that the Hebrews needed an entire generation in order to forget about life in Egypt, so they could receive a better life as God’s people.  Human beings are creatures of habit, and if you’ve spent much time watching the way we behave, it won’t surprise you that the Hebrews frequently ask Moses to take them back to slavery in Egypt.  There are all kinds of instances when their new life of freedom seems hard or unpredictable, so they say to Moses, “take us back to the Pharoah.  Yes, we may have been slaves, but at least we had bread to eat and water to drink, and a place to call home.”  Metaphorically, these protests are supposed to call attention to how hard it can be to have faith that God will provide instead of having something you can predict and control.  Humans want to be in charge of themselves, even if all we are really controlling is our own slavery.  If that seems strange, consider the people from those opening examples I gave, who know they could be happier, but keep making choices that are stealing their lives away.

So the Law in the Old Testament is this new way of life that God takes 40 years to teach the people—a whole generation passes by so that a new generation, who can’t remember Egypt will be the one to take possession of the Promised Land—it’s that hard to forget and change.  At the end of Deuteronomy, there are several long chapters of Scripture where God stresses again and again to the people an idea that culminates in the part we read from chapter 30:  “See I have set before you life and prosperity, death and adversity; choose life so that you and your descendants may thrive and live long in the land.”

Choose life.  Choose the life that God created you for.  This is what we mean when we say that saying yes and saying no is a spiritual matter.  Choose life.  Saying yes and saying no is a spiritual matter we experience every day.

So we see that this daily practice of saying yes and saying no is one that is shared by all of us, and yet it may be new to think about it as a spiritual matter.  The yeses and nos we say in life are a weekly, daily, even hourly matter in which God is with us, and if we choose, we can draw upon God’s wisdom and strength to guide us in our living and to ease our burdens.  The question of “how do I do that?” or “How do I get started?” is often the most challenging, so this morning I’m going to offer you three of many possible examples, one of which we’ll do together.  If any one of these intrigues you, remember that these sermons are recorded and I have a text version that is sharable as well, so don’t burden yourself with remembering each of the steps I’m about to describe—they will be there for you as you need them.

First I want to describe to you a prayer practice called the Examination of Conscience, or Daily Examen.   It is attributable to St. Ignatius of Loyola and common to the Jesuits; it’s recommended for daily use, but it is something you can do just occasionally, or multiple times a day, and it is particularly helpful as we say yes and say no in life.

When I pray this prayer, I start by finding a place where I can be quiet and undisturbed, I take a few deep breaths, and before I start praying about anything else, I pray for the prayer itself, asking God to help me be grateful and honest as we talk.  Next, I review the day that has passed, looking not to make a list of everything that happened, but remembering the things that were most important, especially if they drew an important or emotional response from me, either positive or negative.  What were the things that made me feel grateful for blessed; what were the things that caused me stress or guilt or confusion.  I dwell in each of these situations, thanking God or asking for help as needed.  Importantly, in each of these situations, I ask what about them is helping me to feel closer to God, who loves me, and which ones might be carrying me further away from that same God.  This prayer can tell me a lot about where in life I am saying yes and saying no, and where I may need to ask for help with that.  Once I have looked back, I then look to the day ahead, asking God to be with me when these circumstances and others will arise again, and asking God to be present with me, guiding me through my day.  Finally I close reciting words of grace that are familiar to me, the Lord’s Prayer, or the 23rd Psalm, or a word or phrase that I can carry through my day.  There are many ways to describe the movements of this Daily Examen, and I can provide several for you if you’d like to reach out and ask.

The second means of saying yes and saying no is to place yourself in a group here at church that allows you to share your faith with others.  Many of us have found this in prayer groups like “Soul Friends,” in various “journey groups” that we begin throughout the year in which we meet around a shared interest or study a book together, some find it in our men’s or women’s groups.  And in a few weeks we’ll be launching a new thing called a contemplative pathway group, for Knox members interested in talking about contemplative practices in Christian faith, you’ll hear more about this soon.  Especially when we approach these opportunities with intention and commitment, they can be quite powerful in your daily journey of saying yes and saying no.

The final strategy I offer we will do together, and it is perhaps the most obvious—the act of daily personal prayer, and because prayer doesn’t always come easily, and is sometimes a challenge for every single one of us, today we will practice together.

So I’m going to stop and invite you to take a deep breath, and I’m going to prepare us for a little quiet time to pray about a “no” or “yes” in your life where you may be struggling.

O Lord, hear our prayers.  Help us to be guided by you.  Help us to hear your promise to each us and repeat them often as a way of living: “The Lord is my shepherd.”  Amen.