"WHERE IS YOUR HAPPY PLACE?"
a message by Rev. Dr. Bruce Havens
Coral Isles Church, U.C.C.
August 18, 2024
Psalm 84 NRSV
1 How lovely is your dwelling place, O Lord of hosts!
2 My soul longs, indeed it faints for the courts of the Lord;
my heart and my flesh sing for joy to the living God.
3 Even the sparrow finds a home, and the swallow a nest for herself,
where she may lay her young, at your altars, O Lord of hosts, my Sovereign and my God.
4 Happy are those who live in your house, ever singing your praise.
5 Happy are those whose strength is in you, in whose heart are the highways to Zion.
6 As they go through the valley of Baca they make it a place of springs;
the early rain also covers it with pools.
7 They go from strength to strength; the God of gods will be seen in Zion.
8 O Lord God of hosts, hear my prayer; give ear, O God of Jacob!
9 Behold our shield, O God; look on the face of your anointed.
10 For a day in your courts is better than a thousand elsewhere.
I would rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God than live in the tents of wickedness.
11 For the Lord God is a sun and shield; s/he bestows favor and honor.
Where is your “happy place?” For some folks that picture on the cover of the bulletin would qualify. For others it might be under that water, or on it - in a boat with a fishing pole. Some might say, with my grandchildren. There are probably almost as many different places that qualify as people. But why am I talking about “happy places” in church? What does that have to do with our faith journeys?
Well, I didn’t raise the issue, the Scripture reading did. The Psalm writer begins by celebrating the “dwelling place of God,” and the “courts of the Lord,” then adds,
4 Happy are those who live in your house, ever singing your praise.
5 Happy are those whose strength is in you, in whose heart are the highways to Zion.
Sometimes we get so serious about our faith, and religion can seem to be so heavy we may forget that God is a God of joy, of celebration, of finding peace and love that makes life worth living. This Psalm reminds us that our life with God can be filled with these qualities. We can even find our greatest happiness when we know we are in God’s presence. The good news of course is we do not have to literally be in a “Temple,” or even here in church, to be in God’s presence.
Now this might seem like a bad selling point for someone who ought to be encouraging you to be here in church every Sunday. It might seem counter-productive to say everywhere we go we can be in God’s presence. Everywhere we are is God’s Temple, because in fact, we are God’s Temple. I know the protests of fishermen, golfers, and parents with Sunday Soccer kids. Yes, you can worship God on the golf course, or on or under the water or even on the soccer pitch. I would suggest it is not the same as gathering together with others to worship and praise God.
Even more, what intrigues me about this Psalm is that it celebrates being in God’s presence in worship with others, but it also seems to sense that our relationship with God is not tied to a place or a time. It is the relationship itself. What I mean is that we can experience the presence of God’s spirit, the power of that relationship, even in flashes out in the world that surprise us. Part of the purpose of 10 a.m. on Sunday morning here is to celebrate together our individual moments we have experienced God out there.
Truth is life is often a struggle. This morning as we reflect on mental health issues, happiness can seem like an elusive memory. But sometimes those fleeing moments are powerful reasons to praise God. Joanna, [ Rev. Joanna D’Agostino, “Walk in the Light,” dailydevotional@ucc.org, August 10. 2024 ] wrote, “last year at age 91, my gramma won a beauty pageant. Her nursing home works hard to create a life-affirming environment for people living with dementia, like my gramma. On pageant day, their caregivers styled residents for this special event and invited family to attend. Gramma donned a dazzling red sequin dress and sported bold lipstick from her wheelchair.
“She doesn’t recognize us anymore, and a few years ago when she did know my dad, he was the target of her dementia-induced rage (if you know you know). In some ways, the nursing home staff is her family now. They love her well. She does tell them about us: her family forgot her; she lost us; we lost her. And that is hard.
“But sometimes the light breaks through, as it did on pageant day. When she saw me in the crowd, her eyes lit up. She called me to her and pulled my face to hers, speaking tender words that brought back memories of her love: ‘Hi baby. Sweetheart, where have you been?’ Then she noticed my dad, and the clouds were opened in a moment that evoked the baptism of Christ. She took his hand and said with utter clarity: ‘This is my son, Jeffrey Smith, and I love him so much.’”
She adds, “The recall was fleeting. Moments later, we were strangers, and her crown was a surprise again. But in that mystical moment I witnessed this reality: love transcends. Our hearts remember belovedness.”
Here’s my thought. Feeling God’s love, knowing we are God’s beloved can be fleeting. But it is just as real. Sometimes like a flash of lightning. Other times, yes, it lasts for much longer and it seems we have arrived at a place we wish we could stay forever. But that seems impossible, usually. It doesn’t take away the real feeling of “belovedness.” It doesn’t change the truth that every now and then, if we listen closely, we can hear God whisper, “You are my daughter/my son. I love you so much.” I would say right then you are in God’s Temple, wherever you are.
For too long those in charge of the Christian religion have gone the other way with their messaging. The message was one of guilt and fear. The leaders, who used this for power and control, told us we were bad. They told us we were born bad, we did bad things and God was out to get us for it. I will grant you there are a few people who seem to be wired to do bad. Hard to argue that there is no evil. We also understand that some of that happens due to mental health issues including addictions. We’ve already said we are going to do our best to help those who need help find it and know our love and support as they work their way through it.
And that, to me, is the key to knowing where to find a true happy place. We proclaim a God of unconditional love. This love is for us. It is greater even than any illness, any addiction, and even any evil we can’t explain. God’s love can and will conquer all the things. But the God of the Bible, the God Jesus talked about, does not want us to live in guilt and fear. Jesus talked about this God like the parent of a wayward child, who had insulted the parent, had demanded the parent give that child the inheritance due when the parent died, and had gone off and wasted every bit of it, that parent did the most incredible thing. When he saw that child coming home, still a long way down the road, that parent did the unthinkable. Instead of manipulating the child with guilt or fear, that parent did the most shameful thing. Like some kind of senile old lady, grabbed his robes and pulled them up between his legs and ran like a little child down the road to hug, and kiss and hold that child and weep in happiness. Then that crazy old parent threw the biggest party ever for that child. If you could have asked I suspect that child would admit he had finally come back to the happiest place that child could ever find – in the presence of that love, a love beyond words. He had never really realized until he had nothing else, that nothing else could bring him happiness. He finally went back to the arms of that loving parent. I won’t even get into how that wayward child’s sibling acted. But sure enough that silly, old, half-senile parent went out and poured just as much love out on that alleged good child as the clearly bad child. That’s the God Jesus came to show us.
Now, for me, that is what drives me back here on Sundays. It is a time to thank God for those whispers, those glimpses, those flashes of lightning when I truly know God’s love. To be with others who have also known, and are so grateful for those flashes. It makes getting together to celebrate even better. Here. I can get that here. With ya’ll. And that is why I keep coming back. I don’t do it to preach a sermon or even sing a song.
Come September 9 I will have been doing this as an ordained minister for 40 years! I don’t do it to entertain ya’ll. I do it because that love is my happy place. And every time I come here and remember it, it gives me 1,000 reasons to be happy. It gives me 10,000 reasons to praise the One who has blessed me with that love. That’s why I come here, that’s why I sing – 10,000 reasons for my heart to sing. AMEN.
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