Over the course of the last two weeks, in response to the attacks on New York and Washington and the plane crash in Pennsylvania, the newspapers added sections they called, “The Aftermath.” We read of the stricken economy, our own city and its tourist industry taking a serious hit. We absorbed short biographies of firefighters and police men and women buried in the twisted pile of glass and steel. We shared religious services in memory of thousands listed as missing or killed in the inferno. We brooded over the mixed reactions in the so-called Muslim world. For a while, anyway, Senators Daschelle and Lott sounded like best buddies and the American flag began appearing on truck aerials, in nail salons, and this afternoon, on the back of NFL football helmets. And, yes, we witnessed, from afar, the apotheosis of Rudolph Giuliani—New Yorkers begging he become Mayor for life.

Another aspect of this so-called aftermath, lacing our conversations, compelling us to tune into the latest news, lies in the haunting question, “So how shall America retaliate?” Mount a military crusade? Send the commandos to bring back Osama bin Ladin “dead or alive?” Deploy F-16s and the Carrier USS Theodore Roosevelt to the Persian Gulf? President Bush and his advisors discussed or implemented these options this last week. And on Thursday evening, in his address before a joint session of Congress, in a blunt statement, the President asserted, “We will direct every resource at our command—every means of diplomacy, every tool of intelligence, every instrument of law enforcement, every financial influence and every necessary weapon of war—to the disruption and to the defeat of the global terror network.” He told us to expect “not one battle but a long campaign.” “No quick fixes.” said a former Assistant Secretary of Defense. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld called the pending war buildup “not a sprint but a marathon,” and Secretary of State Colin Powell insisted “We’re in this for the long haul.”

Now friends, that furious September 11th attack and its consequent strategies and warnings regarding retaliation mirror almost exactly one of our Lord’s parables. We read it a moment ago: Jesus couches this parable in a description of what it takes to faithfully bear the Gospel in our world. First, he tells us a Cross could lie at the heart of the Christian life. And then Jesus infers consecrated discipleship engages us in a long haul by devising a parable of going to war. “What king,” he asks, “going out to wage war against another king, will not sit down first and consider whether he is able with ten thousand to oppose the one who comes against him with twenty thousand? If he cannot, then while the other is still far away, he sends a delegation and asks for terms of peace.”

In this parable Jesus insists we church types, if we are serious about our ministry and mission, have a rough road ahead, that serving the Gospel in this or any other time will not be easy, that the risks will be great, the rewards scattered, the victories elusive, and our lives on the line. “Do you want to serve the Gospel?” he asks. Then get ready to engage in a patient, shrewdly planned effort calculating the costs and benefits, the sacrifices and the objectives of serving that Gospel in a world on the brink of war. Indeed, if we were to re-tell the parable this morning, it might sound something like this. “Do you want to be Jesus’ disciple? Are you eager to follow the way of the Gospel? Good. Then, like a president, like a general, like a secretary of defense, like a secretary of state, who, going out to wage war against a terrorist, will consider whether they are able with supersonic jet fighters, aircraft carrier groups, Navy Seals, B-52s, cruise missiles, and amphibious assault vehicles leveled against an adversary existing globally without borders and beachheads, residing not necessarily in some isolated, barren and hostile land, but perhaps in our own suburbs. Are you able, are you equipped to engage and defeat this adversary? Are you truly ready? Are you fully prepared? Have you got what it takes to sustain the battle, suffer the trench warfare, enlist the energy, imagination, courage, integrity, compassion, forgiveness, will and vision to carry your commitment through all the risks and dangers inherent in bearing the weight and responsibility of the Gospel? If not, surrender right now. Give it up. Vacate the field. Tip your hat to the adversary, abandon the good fight and relinquish the world to the divisive, splintering, fragmenting forces decimating the human community.”

If I may say so, this parable is the equivalent of what we might call our Lord’s “call to arms.” He tells us we church folk have the equivalent of a war on our hands in this world and that discipleship and ministry is a strenuous, patient, no-quick-fix task. And Jesus does not himself avoid the risk he envisions for us. He does not sit in some Shenandoah cave, some Capital Hill bomb shelter, some protected Rocky Mountain military bunker and spout important maxims about kings and their solemn military strategizing; he takes his own medicine. He throws himself into the middle of the human condition, takes on the pretensions of the ruling elites, the warring tribes, positions himself in the chasms separating the nations, the races, the creeds—and what? Wins? Claims victory? Wipes out the demons eating us alive? No way. He gets strung up by those who claim to be the pillars of society, the generals and the preachers, blood-lusting crowds and cowardly politicians; he follows his vision of a reconciled and peaceful humanity right to the end—the end— warning us, as he himself suffers it, that the end may be crucifixion or its equivalent.

Now friends, as we consider the nature of our ministry today, as we consider and pray for this young woman we install to our church’s ministry, we know Jesus aims this urgent, decisive challenge at us—and at her. I have been intrigued over these last two weeks by any number of things, but one of them has to do with the conviction that should terrorism as expressed on September 11th be wiped out, then possibly we could go on living in a friendly, decent, orderly and tolerant world. We have heard allusions to expunging evil in such a manner that if terrorist cells in whatever locale are liquidated and so-called terrorists exterminated, the world will turn right-side up and our old routine will surface again; as Jonathan Franzen sarcastically captures the illusion in this week’s New Yorker, suggesting that when this crisis subsides we can return to a “happy era of Game Boy economics and trophy houses,” plus tangling with the simpler things making our day, if you will, like the mysteries of Big Dig signage, or Green Line delay or Pedro’s shut-down or drinks at the Ritz tomorrow afternoon. Franzen reminds hat the New York Daily News front page headline on Monday September 10th read, “Kip’s Bay Tenants: We’ve Got Killer Mold.” For New Yorkers, and in a way for all of us, he says, “This front page is (and will, for a while remain) amazing.” It is from another world. Or so it seems. But not really. Many of us in this room will remember a brilliant article by Francis Fukuyama some decade ago entitled “The End of History.” It dealt with our common life following the fall of the Berlin Wall and floated the notion, as Fareed Zakaria encapsulates it, that after the cold war, “ideological or political tussles were dead and life would be spent managing the economy and worrying about consumerism.” Zakaria insists that among other things Tuesday the 11th spelled the end to the end of history and put back into the saddle not only economics as a overriding global concern, but politics, government, international relations, militarism and vast cultural and religious chasms, and yes, searing questions about the very ground of our existence. And he asks, “Who can look at the extraordinary sacrifices made by firefighters and policemen of New York City and still believe that making a million dollars is the meaning of life?” You see, friends, ours is a ministry, as Jesus strongly suggests, demanding commitment to the long haul. Long after terrorist cells dissipate and poisoned pills and anthrax and car bombs settle into the landscape, this side of heaven there will be a great work to do. The gulfs separating us by nation, class, income, religion, culture, gender will continue to confront, confound and challenge us; the ministry of justice and reconciliation will remain the order of the day with no promise that in our time we will succeed, that indeed, the true cost of plunging into the depths of the bloody human condition, may itself end up in rejection, misunderstanding, harsh resistance, perhaps hatred and—what?—crucifixion. But should we expect a lighter, softer, more gentle landing than that meted out to the master?

And dare we say anything about the nature, the quality and the depth of the ministry and mission of this church and the future of this young woman other than that which Riverside Church’s Harry Emerson Fosdick articulated almost six decades ago, as a massive war began to engulf the earth. Incredibly, he called it “a great time to be alive.” He envisioned it as a time to return to fundamentals. “You have heard it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I say to you, ‘Love your enemy and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be children—all of you—of your Father who is in heaven. For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the terrorists do the same? And if you greet only your brothers and sisters, what more are you doing than others? Do not even Hijackers do the same? Be perfect in conceiving everyone as a child of God, even as God does.” And yes, “Let justice roll down like waters and righteousness like an ever flowing stream.”

A great time to be alive. In that sermon of 1941 Dr. Fosdick tells of a cartoon showing a group of diplomats sitting down after the First World War to begin contemplation of a new world order. At the head of the table sits President Wilson and surrounding him all the familiar portfolios: the Secretary of War, the Secretary of State. But among them appeared another figure: Jesus of Nazareth, with portfolio: the Secretary of human and international relationships. A dream! A vision. A hope while we wrestle with the anger and hatred, the ignorance and stupidity, the partial vision and self-interest lacing the human condition, the consequence of which we see in the rubble of Manhattan and the mounting artillery of containment and retaliation. Indeed: a dream. A Vision. A hope not for a sprint but for a marathon, not so long as we dig it, but for the long haul.

So, we install this morning a young woman claimed by the Christian Ministry. This last week her world changed no less so than ours. She comes to us with enormous gifts: a young woman with wisdom far beyond her years, a passion for social justice, an eye for fairness, an eagerness for team play, a fine intellect bound to a great heart, an ebullience and love of life, laughter that is infectious. Jennifer: what a privilege to welcome you aboard now in this official position. You’re a good one! And all of us, Associate Minister Lael Murphy, the officers and the members of this congregation, your colleagues in the ministry of the United Church of Christ and the Church Universal rejoice and confess a great consolation as we count you by our side, facing the challenge, sharing the joy—over the long haul—of this mission, this ministry of our sovereign and savior, Jesus Christ.

Scripture Reading
Luke 14:23-35

Then the master said to the slave, ‘Go out into the roads and lanes, and compel people to come in, so that my house may be filled. For I tell you, none of those who were invited will taste my dinner.’ ”

Now large crowds were traveling with him; and he turned and said to them, “Whoever comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes, and even life itself, cannot be my disciple. Whoever does not carry the cross and follow me cannot be my disciple. For which of you, intending to build a tower, does not first sit down and estimate the cost, to see whether he has enough to complete it? Otherwise, when he has laid a foundation and is not able to finish, all who see it will begin to ridicule him, saying, ‘This fellow began to build and was not able to finish.’ Or what king, going out to wage war against another king, will not sit down first and consider whether he is able with ten thousand to oppose the one who comes against him with twenty thousand? If he cannot, then, while the other is still far away, he sends a delegation and asks for the terms of peace. So therefore, none of you can become my disciple if you do not give up all your possessions.

“Salt is good; but if salt has lost its taste, how can its saltiness be restored? It is fit neither for the soil nor for the manure pile; they throw it away. Let anyone with ears to hear listen!”