Ephesians 4:1-7
My son-in-law, Edgar Rodriguez, or “Mr. Rodz” as he’s known
at McAllen Memorial High School, lives and breathes ‘theatre.’ He has been an
actor, set-builder, and is now a teacher and director. I am amazed and
astounded to see how he works with young people in high school. He is able both
to see that ‘something’ inside his students and pull it out of them.
The shy, timid young lady is cast in a part that taps something inside of
her…and two months later she stands boldly on the stage reciting her lines. The
rough and rowdy young fellow takes a part, dons the costume, and six weeks
later stands before the audience composed, focused. My son-in-law takes a
random group of young people, hands them a script, constructs a set, gives them
costumes, and they present a work, a musical, a drama that somehow touches our
hearts.
Shakespeare says, “All the world’s a stage, and all the men
and women merely players. They have their exits and entrances, and one man in
his time plays many parts….” He is right. The world is a stage, and you
and I are part of a vast cosmic drama being played out through history, a drama
that reveals the story of God’s love for the world and enacts the redemption of
this world. God is the director, his son has the lead role, and you and I the
supporting cast.
Perhaps due to the accident of architecture, we often get it
wrong. For some reason, we construct the buildings where our congregations
gather kind of like theatres. We have rows of seats or pews filled with people
all facing a raised platform…a platform where a few folks speak, read, sing,
pray, and so forth. It might even feel like those who sit in the rows are
observers or an audience. But, in this cosmic drama, there is an audience of
one—God. All the rest of us are players. Nowhere in Scripture are we called to
be ‘spectators,’ nowhere. All of us have a part to play … and that is what Paul
points out in todays reading. We have received ‘gifts’—parts to play.
We receive a playbook (the Bible), a director’s guide if you
will, that lays out the history of the narrative, that provides the plot. Of
course, the plot is God’s unfolding redemption of the Creation…a redemption
that includes you and me and all of us. The guide doesn’t give us lines to
say—we get to ad lib. But, we are shown how to speak—with grace, with kindness,
with forgiveness. The playbook doesn’t lay out all of our actions and turns.
But, we are taught how to move—serving, helping, building. And, we are given
character, persona, shape in our lives. We have often called these ‘spiritual
gifts,’ but we can just as well call them costume and character. God by His
Spirit gifts us with parts to play (see 1 Cor. 12:1-11).
Shakespeare gets one thing wrong: “…and all men and women
merely players….” In God’s drama, there are no “merely.” Every player matters,
every character is important, every gift given is done so with purpose. We are
players in God’s cosmic drama of redemption. Every Sunday we gather, we greet,
we serve, we learn, we sing, we read, we pray, we hear God’s word—yet, all of
this on Sunday is a dress rehearsal for playing out this redemption drama in our daily
lives: at home, at school, at work, in the streets, at the stores, in the
restaurants and bars, in the parks.
Silence on the set. Lights. Action! Let us live our part in
the story of redemption today….
Sunday, August 25,
2024
“Walking…onto the Stage” (Also, “Walking…for the Long Haul”)
Watch/Listen: HERE
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