“Hearts to God: Risk Taking”
First Congregational Church – Wauwatosa, Wisconsin
22nd Sunday after Pentecost/Reformation Sunday – October 31, 2004
Rev. Steven A. Peay, Ph.D.
[Texts: 2 Thessalonians 1:1-4, 11-12/Luke 19:1-10]

            “Zacchaeus was a wee little man . . .” so goes the song I learned long ago in Sunday School. I’ve wondered since if Randy Newman might have written “Short people got no body” under the inspiration of this story – who knows? This much we do know; Zacchaeus wanted to see Jesus and was willing to take a risk to do it. He risked his health by climbing a tree and he risked his dignity, too. After all, he was the chief tax collector, a man of wealth and influence. There must have been something pretty remarkable to get someone like Zacchaeus to take that kind of risk.

            Whatever Zacchaeus was looking for in Jesus, he came out of the encounter with a changed perspective. Jesus notices him out on a limb and calls him by name. In that moment Zacchaeus either has a revelation or a moment of profound recollection, because he realizes who he really is. I think this story is so appropriate as we recall those who took a great risk and initiated what has come to be known as the Protestant Reformation.  It was on this day, the ‘eve of All Saints,’ that Luther posted his 95 Theses on the door of the Castle Church in Wittenberg. He had come to a new sense of himself, realizing that it was grace and faith that brought salvation, and was thus willing to risk everything for God. As the late Paul Tillich, 20th century Swiss theologian, said, “The saint is saint, not because he is ‘good,’ but because he is transparent for something more than he himself is.” All of my reading seems to indicate that being willing to take risks for something greater, to go out on a limb for God if you will, is the true stuff that makes one a saint and moves one to become a reformer.

            Zacchaeus takes a risk and becomes transparent to who he really is: “a son of Abraham.” The story isn’t explicit, but the fact he was a Jew and functioned as a tax collector implies that he was a collaborator with the Romans. Further, that he was rich implies that he profited from his people’s misery under the occupying power. So, when he takes the risk and Christ shows him his true self he acts – “Look, half of my possessions, Lord, I will give to the poor; and if I have defrauded anyone of anything, I will pay back four times as much.” He has a new perspective on himself, on God, on life itself and acts accordingly.

            Can you imagine his wife’s reaction? It’s bad enough that he brings home this itinerant Rabbi and now he’s going to give away half of everything they own! (I wonder if Israel was a community property state?) For Zacchaeus to act in that manner, then, takes faith, and that is what has happened here. God has increased his faith and now Zacchaeus gets the vision of what life is supposed to be like. New perspective leads to increased faith and increased faith leads to abundant life.

            What had happened was that Christ’s heart had spoken directly to Zacchaeus’ heart. I know it’s hard to fathom, because what we read is, “Zacchaeus, hurry and come down; for I must stay at your house today.” But in that simple invitation there was an invitation to a new life and a new heart, for in Jesus God reached out to this man alienated from his people and himself and invited him into relationship. God takes the risk of relationship and extends love and mercy and hope to humanity again and again. God’s risk to us is to open the divine heart, the divine affection to us.

So the physiological heart, what the anatomist studies, is symbolic of a deeper reality. The heart is the source and the unity of our human experience and it is with this reality that God identifies in Christ, the Logos, the Word made flesh. The twentieth century Austrian theologian, Karl Rahner, put this beautifully when he wrote: " . . .the eternal logos of God has a human heart, he risked the adventure of a human heart, until pierced by the sin of the world, it had flowed out, until it had suffered to the end on the cross the uselessness and powerlessness of his love and become thereby the eternal heart of the world." And the seventeenth century Puritan preacher, Richard Baxter, put it no less beautifully when he said:

If thou know him not by the face, the voice, the hands, if thou know him not by the tears and bloody sweat, thou mayest know him by the heart; that broken healed heart is his; that soul pitying, melting heart is his, doubtless it can be none's but his, love and compassion are its certain signatures.

In Christ we recognize God's affection for humanity and heart speaks to heart.

It was this understanding of God's great identification with us, his affection for us, which stirred the Reformers of the Church into action. Like Zacchaeus, Luther, Calvin, Barrow, Greenwood, Penry, Ames, and Robinson, to name only a few, heard Christ speaking to them as heart cried out to heart. Each, in a unique and wonderful way, was invited to come down and enter into a new relationship with God and was moved to act and to make a difference in his world

For English Congregational reformers Henry Barrow, John Greenwood and the Welshman John Penry the way would lead to years of imprisonment and a cruel death for their faith. John Robinson, pastor to the gathered saints of Scrooby, was forced to leave the country of his birth and died before he could join his pilgrim flock in the new world. Their example of heart speaking to heart reminds us of the dedication and the courage we must have as God's gathered people. Jesus continues to call us into relationship and we follow him, even though it means taking risks.

            Heart speaks to heart and calls us to follow along the way. The way leads us into the community of the heart we call the church. Gathered into relationship by a living covenant we experience the wonder of God's presence through our sisters and brothers who walk the way with us. It is here that we take the risk of relationship and open our hearts, as God has opened God’s heart, so that others may find welcome, peace, and safety among us. We are called to a new and better hope and, as a consequence, called to action. The church, as Cyprian of Carthage said almost two thousand years ago, is always reforming itself. If we are true to what we say we are, we are constantly responding to Christ's invitation to relationship and then, like Zaccheus, we act in a positive and loving way, because we have taken the risk of relationship – gone out on a limb, if you will – and gained a new perspective on ourselves, on God, and on our world.  

            Paul counsels the same kind of renewed perspective to the persecuted church in Thessalonica. He urges them to see their situation with the eyes of faith and not despair. Keep growing in faith and acting in love, “so that the name of the Lord Jesus Christ may be glorified in you, and you in him . . .” Go out on the limb – God is with you.

            As I read these texts I couldn’t help but think of this gathering of saints that is First Congregational Church. This church has made a positive contribution to this community and to the greater church for 162 years. Let me give you an example, it was in this very meeting house that our National Association entered into covenant and adopted its articles of association on October 25, 1956. It was a risk to begin a new venture, one that would continue our Way of being church together, and it continues to be a risk, just like all relationships. However, those risks we take for that which is of God, that which is true and beautiful and good, make a difference in people’s lives and in our life together.

            Not quite ten years ago this church took another risk when it called a fugitive priest-monk to be its teaching minister – and certainly took a risk when they called him back to be the senior minister! Yet, that risk has paid off for both the one called and for this church, hasn’t it? When heart speaks to heart and we take the risk of relationship good things can, and do, happen.

            The truth is we’re still out on a limb. We’re still taking risks as we seek to reach out to our community. The goals that came out of our ‘visioning time’ and the plan our Long Range Planning committee and council have crafted to achieve them involve our opening ourselves to some new ideas and some new challenges. Honestly, there are what one business scholar has called ‘bhags’ here – ‘bhag’ means ‘big hairy audacious goal.’ There are things here that are a stretch and that’s good.  Our seeking to deepen and grow as God’s people is a risk that is going to involve a cost to us and will draw us to give of our time, our talent, and our treasure.

Zacchaeus went up that tree and got a new perspective and if we’re living our faith, so should we. Now we must allow that new perspective to show through our words, our actions, and our attitudes. Without question, this is a good place and there are good things happening. However, there is still much to do here, will we, like Zacchaeus, get the vision and act? Will we give generously of ourselves and of our substance to see that new perspective making a difference here on Church Street and beyond?

            Jesus passes this way today and calls to us. He wants to reassure us that we are loved, that God is still with us. How do we respond to his message? Zacchaeus, and countless others like him in every age, went out on a limb for God, and God acted through them. I think it’s our turn to go out on the limb, to seek the new perspective, and to get the vision. If we’re faithful in taking the risk, we’ll hear those wonderful words, “Today salvation has come to this house . . .” but before it can come, we have to go out on a limb. Wanting to see Jesus, having a burning desire to love God and neighbors, and taking the risks involved to do so is what makes a saint and a Congregational Church, according to the Cambridge Platform, is made up of ‘saints by calling. Becoming a saint isn’t about being ‘good,’ it’s about heart speaking to heart and then being willing to go out on a limb for God. Amen.