Sermons

Minister: Rev. Margaret A. Beckman | Don’t ask what the world needs. Ask what makes you come alive, and go do it. Because what the world needs is people who have come alive.  ~Howard Washington Thurman
There are two questions that [a person] must ask [themselves]. The first is “Where am I going?” and the second is “Who will go with me?” If you ever get these questions in the wrong order, you are in trouble. ~ Howard Thurman
 

READING  #498 Singing the Living Tradition

In the quietness of this place, surrounded by the all-pervading presence of the Holy, my heart whispers:
Keep fresh before me the moments of my High Resolve, that in good times or in tempests,
I may not forget that to which my life is committed.
Keep fresh before me the moments of my high resolve.

Words of The Reverend Dr. Howard Thurman
 
The movement of the Spirit of God in the hearts of men and women often calls them to act against the spirit of their times or causes them to anticipate a spirit which is yet in the making. In a moment of dedication they are given wisdom and courage to dare a deed that challenges and to kindle a hope that inspires.

Footprints of a Dream : The Story of the Church for the Fellowship of All Peoples(1959), p. 7
 

SERMON
“Howard Thurman has been called a teacher of teachers, a preacher of preachers, an activator of activists, and a mover of movers. A visionary religious leader and thinker, he was a guide and inspiration to Martin Luther King Jr., James Farmer, Marion Wright Edelman, Bayard Rustin, Jesse Jackson, and many others in the struggle for civil rights, justice, and freedom. Thurman’s work speaks directly to today’s personal and social issues, highlighting the powerful connection between spirituality and social transformation.…

At a time of local, national, and global conflict, [Fellowship Church] he sought to discover whether meaningful experiences of spiritual unity among people could be more compelling than all that divides them, transcending the barriers of race, religion, nationality, culture, and social class. Throughout his life, Thurman’s central pursuit was the search for authentic community – the “common ground” (to use his term) among people at the root of our humanness and our spiritual nature.”[1]   ~ Dr. Liza Rankow
 

Howard Thurman is not well known despite his enormous contributions to progressive religion and interfaith dialogue, mystical spirituality, civil rights and racial justice and a poetic style of preaching that emphasizes silence as well as the spoken word.

Let me recount just two events in his life that may give you a glimpse into his character.

Howard Thurman’s father died when he was just nine years old. He was raised in great part by his grandmother who lived her early life enslaved and remained illiterate throughout her life. She instilled in him a deep spirituality that guided him throughout his life. Education, something she never had, was important in the Thurman family. They lived in poverty in strict racial segregation in Florida. There were only three high schools for black students in Florida and so Howard had to leave home to go to school.

Thurman’s family scraped together the funds to send him to high school in Jacksonville. However, at the train station, Thurman was told he had to pay extra to send his baggage. Buying the ticket had left him destitute; he had no more to ship his trunk. Penniless, the boy sat down on the steps and began to cry. Then, a stranger – a black man dressed in overalls – walked by and paid the charges. He didn’t introduce himself, and Thurman never learned his name.

When Thurman wrote his autobiography, “With Head and Heart” he dedicated it “to the stranger in the railroad station in Daytona Beach who restored my broken dream sixty-five years ago.” Thurman had remembered that kindness for the remainder of his life.

When he was in his mid- thirties while teaching at Howard University, in 1935-36, Thurman led a delegation of African Americans on a pilgrimage of friendship to meet Mohandas Gandhi. God-given faith, Gandhi proclaimed, could be used to fight the oppression of white American segregation. He challenged Thurman to rethink the idea of Christianity as a religion used by whites to keep blacks “in their place” with images of a white Christ and ideas of a land of milk and honey in the great beyond. Hindu principles offered Indians a basis for nonviolent opposition to British power, he said. Did Christianity have a similar power to overcome white racism?

Thurman considered this visit to India a watershed experience in his life. In addition to Gandhi, he met Rabindranath Tagore and Hindus, Buddhists, and Muslims. They challenged him to explain his adherence to “the Christianity of the slaveholders, lynch mobs, and other white supremacists in the U.S.A.” … Thurman found himself making a ‘careful distinction between Christianity and the religion of Jesus’ – and identifying himself with the latter.[2]

Thurman remained skeptical of theologies and fundamentalism during his life. His spirituality was a reflection of deep personal encounters with the divine.
“Watering the roots of our spirit – as Thurman would say – is essential for renewal in order to avoid burnout, but also to deepen the place from which we engage, so that we may come from a more profound vision and integrity in our work for a better world.”[3] Dr. Liza Rankow
He pioneered a form of spiritual activism that blended contemplation with confrontation. He was “one of the unacknowledged shapers of 20th century America,” according to historian, Peter Eisenstadt.

In his search for truth and meaning, Howard Thurman came to understand the unity of all – what we might refer to as the interdependent web of all existence. Thurman was already preaching about this unity in the mid-20th Century.

Thurman’s belief in the unity of all people and his philosophy of the Search for Common Ground was a two-fold journey. The first step is one of personal self-exploration. He would say: “When you can go deep down inside yourself, really know who you are and are secure in who you are—then—you can find yourself in every other human being.” 

The second step is to meet the human desire to be part of a community. Thurman believed: “…that meaningful and creative shared experiences shared between people can be more compelling than all of the faiths, fears, concepts, ideologies, and prejudices that divide; and if these experiences can be multiplied and sustained over a sufficient duration of time, then any barrier that separates one person from another can be undermined and eliminated.” 

We can begin to see the influence of Howard Thurman on civil rights leaders and interfaith pioneers who would become more famous but never more committed. Commitment to the ministry of justice, he thought, always ought to be balanced by and grounded in a life-affirming and hope-inspiring personal spirituality. Theologies and religions are transient. Personal spirituality grounded in direct personal experience, is reliable for courage, wisdom and strength for the journey.

One of Thurman’s last public appearances was at Spelman College on May 4, 1980 when he delivered the Baccalaureate Address “The Sound of the Genuine”.
There is in every person something that waits and listens for the sound of the genuine in herself. . . . There is in you something that waits and listens for the sound of the genuine in yourself. Nobody like you has ever been born and no one like you will ever be born again—you are the only one. And if you miss the sound of the genuine in you, you will be a cripple all the rest of your life. Because you will never be able to get a scent on who you are.
…
So the burden of what I have to say to you is, “What is your name—who are you—and can you find a way to hear the sound of the genuine in yourself?” There are so many noises going on inside of you, so many echoes of all sorts, so many internalizing of the rumble and the traffic, the confusions, the disorders by which your environment is peopled that I wonder if you can get still enough—not quiet enough—still enough to hear rumbling up from your unique and essential idiom the sound of the genuine in you. I don’t know if you can. But this is your assignment.
…
There is in every person that which waits, waits, waits and listens for the sound of the genuine in herself. There is that in every person that waits—waits and listens—for the sound of the genuine in other people. And when these two sounds come together, this is the music God heard when He said, “Let us make man in our image.”
The sound of the genuine. We find the still point and listen. First we listen for the sound in ourselves. Then, we wait. We wait and we listen. And if we are still enough and patient enough, we will hear the sound of the genuine in others. And this is the beginning of Beloved Community and hope for our future.

There is a sound of the genuine in me that is mine alone. There is a sound of the genuine in you that is yours alone. Together, it is the music of the universe, the music of the divine.

My highest resolve is to be true to the sound of the genuine in me.
May I not forget that to which my life is committed.
Keep fresh before me the moments of my high resolve.

Dear Spiritual Companions, may we continue to find that still point and may we listen. May we listen for our own sound of the genuine and for the sound of others. Deepening our own spirituality. Seeing others as worthy of dignity and respect, more friend than foe. Finding wisdom and courage to dare to act in ways that challenge injustice and kindle a hope that inspires.

Blessed Be.   I Love You.   Amen.

[1] Howard Thurman: Spirituality & Social Change. Dr. Liza Rankow, February 14, 2012. Dr. Liza Rankow is an interfaith minister and the founding director of OneLife Institute.  She regularly teaches classes on Thurman in community and academic settings, and is co-editor of the six-CD audio collection, “The Living Wisdom of Howard Thurman.”

[2] Vincent Harding in the Introduction to For the Inward Journey, The Writings of Howard Thurman. Richmond, Indiana: Friends United Meeting, 1984. Pp. xi-xii.

[3] Liza Rankow.