Final version of the "Faith is from hearing" sermon

1 files changed, 63 insertions, 38 deletions

diff --git a/faith/faith_is_from_hearing.rst b/faith/faith_is_from_hearing.rst
index 947bee1..5cdc371 100644
--- a/faith/faith_is_from_hearing.rst
+++ b/faith/faith_is_from_hearing.rst
@@ -5,12 +5,15 @@ Faith is from hearing
 
 .. role:: language-el
 
-:date: 2020-05-03T12:26:45
-:status: draft
+:date: 2020-08-30T12:00:00
 :category: faith
 :tags: sermon, english, listening
 
-    So faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ.
+(this sermon was in seriously modified version preached_ at the
+Prague Christian Fellowship on Sunday, August 30, 2020).
+
+    So faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of
+    Christ.
 
     -- Romans 10,17 ESV
 
@@ -96,51 +99,70 @@ and it can also start to be a burden.
 What would you do if you were a deacon in your church charged
 with managing donations of the congregation for the various
 missionaries and you’ve got an application from a young failed
-school teacher, whose only mission statement was “to hug the
-dying poorest in the streets of the poorest city in the world”?
-Not building a hospital or hospice, just hugging them. Or what
-about the missionary who failed in his mission because of his
-mental illness, but he wanted to start painting pictures
-completely different from anything anybody painted before him?
-How high would these stand on the list of the church-sponsored
-missions? My deep suspicion is that they would never get much if
-anything from your congregation. Congratulations, you have just
-rejected the support for Mother Theresa of Calcutta and Vincent
-van Gogh. Many people don’t know, but because of his madness he
-had to leave the mission field and thus he became just one of the
-most influential figures in the history of Western Art.
+school teacher, whose only mission statement is “to hug the dying
+poorest in the streets of the poorest city in the world”? Not
+building a hospital or hospice, just hugging them. Or what about
+a missionary who had the real passion for the poor, so much so he
+got into conflict with his comfortably middle-class denomination,
+tried to have mission on faith without any outside support, but
+poor were really poor, so he failed again, and the his mental
+illness started to show, so he asks for the third chance, and he
+wants to start painting pictures completely different from
+anything anybody painted before him? How high would these stand
+on the list of the church-sponsored missions? My deep suspicion
+is that they would never get much if anything from your
+congregation. Congratulations, you have just rejected the support
+for Mother Theresa of Calcutta and Vincent van Gogh. Many people
+don’t know it, but because of his madness he had to leave the
+mission field and thus he became just one of the most influential
+figures in the history of Western Art.
 
 Vincent van Gogh is just one of many representatives of how
 Protestantism completely missed on art. I was saying that the
 biggest Protestant tradition is one of purposeful action. The
 problem is that true art doesn’t have any purpose. It is much
-closer to the Jewish (and Catholic!) idea of sacrifice. Artists
-give to God his best without much knowledge of what God will use
-his gift for. If ever for anything. From the first-class masters
-who really changed the history of art and who were openly
-Protestant I can think perhaps just about Johan Sebastian Bach,
-and he was a Lutheran (who are much closer to the Catholicism
-than any other branch of Protestantism, perhaps except for the
-Anglicanism) and most of his commissions were from the Catholic
-German princes anyway. And since then the relationship between
-the greatest Protestant artists and Church was usually tight at
-best. One example of many. When they asked Johnny Cash in his
-last interview before his death (who would certainly qualify as
-a deeply believing Protestant Christian and a first-class artist
-breaking new ground in his field), whether he was a Christian
-artist, he resolutely rejected the idea saying “I am not
-a Christian artist, I am an artist who happens to be
-a Christian.” I believe he meant by the Christian art that which
-is purposeful, music and other forms of the artistic expression
-which are meant to serve to help Christians to worship, to create
-beautiful churches, but which is not true art in above-mentioned
-terms of the purposeless sacrifice.
+closer to the Jewish (and Catholic!) idea of sacrament (in this
+context, it has nothing to do with the Lord’s Supper and
+baptism). Not far from us, at Hradčany, there used to be until
+recently a monastery of the Discalced Carmelites nuns, who
+basically shut themselves into something which seriously
+resembles a prison for the rest of their lives and they just pray
+there for the nation and the world. There is absolutely zero
+return on investment from their prayers, they just believe that
+the Lord will use those prayers in His own way. I am not saying
+that I personally like the idea, but even I should accept that
+this very old tradition honoured by our brothers in Christ for
+centuries. But mostly the incomprehensibility of this Christian
+tradition for us makes me suspicious whether we haven’t got too
+much stuck in our own ways.
+
+Or back to artists. They give to God his best without much
+knowledge of what God will use his gift for. If ever for
+anything. From the first-class masters who really changed the
+history of art and who were openly Protestant I can think perhaps
+only about Johan Sebastian Bach, and he was a Lutheran (who are
+much closer to the Catholicism than any other branch of
+Protestantism, perhaps except for the Anglicanism) and most of
+his commissions were from the Catholic German princes anyway. And
+since then the relationship between the greatest Protestant
+artists and Church was usually tight at best. One example of
+many. When they asked Johnny Cash in his last interview before
+his death (who would certainly qualify as a deeply believing
+Protestant Christian and a first-class artist breaking new ground
+in his field), whether he was a Christian artist, he resolutely
+rejected the idea saying “I am not a Christian artist, I am an
+artist who happens to be a Christian.” I believe he meant by the
+Christian art that which is purposeful, music and other forms of
+the artistic expression which are meant to serve to help
+Christians to worship, to create beautiful churches, but which is
+not true art in above-mentioned terms of the purposeless
+sacrifice.
 
 I could talk about the avoidance of pain in the so-called
 Christian Art, but that would be another awfully long digression,
 of which I will spare you.
 
-What I mean is that by avoiding hearing we lose a huge part of
+So, I wonder whether by avoiding hearing we lose a huge part of
 the Christian spirituality, which could lead to our voice being
 more authentic in the rapidly changing new world we are entering.
 
@@ -265,5 +287,8 @@ those who need it.
 
 Amen.
 
+.. _preached:
+   https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC-b2YU-CKXI9_T790YvmcvA
+
 .. _`It’s Not About the Nail`:
    https://youtu.be/-4EDhdAHrOg