Who are your Lifelines? - A Sermon for Christmas
- Details
- Created on Sunday, 20 December 2009 00:00
- Written by Gary E. Smith
{player 2009-12-20-11am-sermon.mp3}
The television show was called “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire,” a show brought over from Britain, broadcast on ABC, one of the highest rated shows on television at the time. “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire” was hosted by Regis Philbin, as in Regis and Kathy. There were flashy lights and dramatic music.
Don’t hold me to the details of the rules. Let’s just say that by some process the producers came up with a single contestant who sat opposite Regis on a brightly lit and flashing floor, surrounded by the audience. The first question was for $32,000, and all questions were four option multiple choice. The early questions were embarrassingly easy: “What is the color at the top of the traffic light?” “What does the ‘N’ stand for on the transmission stick?” And so on.
When the contestant answered, Regis asked in a doubting and menacing way, “is that your final answer?” And the lights flashed. If the answer was correct, the amount of the next question doubled and was slightly more difficult. And the contestant could always stop and go home with the money already won. $64,000 $125,000 $500,000 $1 million.
You are thinking, isn’t this supposed to be a Christmas sermon, and he is talking about a ten-year-old quiz show with Regis Philbin. There is one more piece to this quiz show that I have not revealed. The contestant on “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire” was entitled to what are called lifelines. In the quiz show, as contrasted with real life, the contestant could have three lifelines in the course of the competition. That is, if the contestant was stumped, they could ask to have two wrong answers removed from the options, the contestant could ask the audience [they voted electronically], or the contestant could phone one of five friends, who by pre-arrangement were standing by on their home phones during the show.
These are the lifelines. I remember one contestant who DID win a million dollars, and he used only one lifeline, on the final one million dollar question. He was connected to his father, and he said, “Dad, I don’t need your help on this question. I just wanted to tell you I am about to win $1 million!” Regis about swallowed his tongue.
Think about it. I love this twist on the usual game show format. On the “$64,000 Question”, wasn’t the contestant put in a sound-proof isolation booth? On “Jeopardy”, for the final answer, protective shields are put up between the contestants, and that music is played for the allotted thirty seconds to increase the pressure. On “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire”, there was no time limit. On “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire”, the contestant was not alone. Ask the audience. Ask your friends. Ask Regis to eliminate two wrong answers. Take your time.
There are seasonal metaphors here everywhere. Allow me to point toward two connections from this former quiz show to our lives. I believe that, more often than not, we function in our day-to-day living as if we are in an isolation booth with the seconds counting down. I believe that, more often than not, when we are faced with the final Jeopardy question [“Please be sure to put your answer in the form of a question.”] we can almost hear the countdown music blaring in our ears. I believe that, more often than not, we know the question we are being asked is so easy, but our mind draws a blank, and we know that we are going to look like an idiot in front of the audience, an audience of our own making.
Consider the kinds of questions we are asked, on a day-to-day basis. They are not always questions of fact. They are not questions such as, “what is the second largest of the Great Lakes?” or “What was Pope John Paul I’s given name?” Rather, we are asked far more difficult questions, such as,
“Shall I say I’m sorry to my child, and lose some [or much] of my pride?”
“Shall I reach out to my sister who never writes or calls?”
“Shall I tell my client that my company is not treating him fairly?”
“Shall I apologize to my patient for my abruptness in the office last week?”
“Shall I tell my husband that I made a mistake, and that I’m sorry?”
“Shall I consider changing this job in which I’m so unhappy?”
“Has the time come for me to move and to realize that I can no longer care for myself?”
“Shall I tell this man that I’m dating that the relationship is not going anywhere?”
“If I make this decision, am I “holding on to what is good”?
These are the kinds of questions we are facing all the time. And, more often than not, we go it alone. What if we had a lifeline? What if our audience could vote? What if we had five friends or five family members already waiting by a telephone to help us with the answer? The first thing I want to say about “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire” is that it pointed toward the possibility of lifelines in our lives.
Who are your lifelines? What are the five phone numbers you would metaphorically give to Regis and the producers as the show begins? Who stands by the telephone for you? This is a season for that kind of inventory. This is a season to touch base with those folks and to let their love and reassurance warm your soul. This is a season to realize that you do not have to go it alone. This is a season to step out of the isolation booth. This is a season to have Regis take away two wrong answers. This is a season to let the audience vote, that audience that surrounds you and knows you and is pulling for you to win the full million.
Who are your lifelines? They could be person or place or poet or memory or object. This is a season for inventory. “Remember the sky you were born under,” says the poet Joy Harjo, “know each of the star’s stories… Remember your birth, your mother, your father. Remember the earth, remember the earth, the plants, the trees, the animals. Remember the wind. Remember that you are all people and that all people are you. Remember the dance that language is, that life is. Remember.” These are the lifelines. This is a season to remember the lifelines. There is an audience there for you. There are people waiting by the telephone for you. There is a religious community here for you. There are ministers here for you. “Remember that you are all people and that all people are you. Remember.”
If the first thing to say about “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire” is that it points toward the possibility of lifelines in our lives, then the second thing to say is that we, too, are lifelines for somebody else. You are a lifeline for somebody. You are a lifeline for many. “Remember that you are all people and that all people are you,” says the poet. You are a lifeline for somebody. This could be a lifeline as near as the person sitting by your side at this moment. This room is filled with people who are going it alone: holding a secret, remembering a miscarriage, worried over a medical prognosis, insecure about the future, unhappy about an angry conversation, thinking some particular family dynamic ONLY happens in your family, remembering a death and feeling empty.
These people have gone into the isolation booth and put on the earphones, and are now waiting for the 60 second clock to tick down and no answers come to their lips. They need you. They need all of us. We need all of us. We need a lifeline. We need to let the audience vote. We need to be connected to that one person on the other end of the line who can help us with the answer. There is an anonymity here in this room. We do not know everyone here, but we do know that the needs here are human needs. “Remember that you are all people and that all people are you.” You are someone’s lifeline.
You are a lifeline for many. The Jesus whose birth we celebrate this week taught this very same lesson. You are a lifeline to the poor in spirit, he said, to those who mourn, to the meek, to those who hunger and thirst for righteousness. You are a lifeline to all these. You are a lifeline to the hungry, he taught, to the thirsty, to the stranger, to the naked, to the sick, to those in prison. You are a lifeline to all these.
The Unitarians believe more in what Jesus taught than in who Jesus was. Maybe he was the Savior. Maybe he was the Christ. Maybe he is Lord. I do not know. I can allow for the possibility. But I do know his teachings. We do know these things. We do know the “go out into the world in peace” part, the “have courage, hold on to what is good, return to no person evil for evil, strengthen the fainthearted, support the weak, help the suffering, honor all beings” part. How can you celebrate Christmas as Unitarians, we are asked? How can we not? We believe in his teachings. We remember the sky that he was born under. We believe in that light that shone forth from his being. How can we not celebrate Christmas?
“Are you willing to forget what you have done for other people,” wrote Henry Van Dyke one hundred years ago, “and to remember what other people have done for you; to ignore what the world owes you, to think what you owe the world; to put your rights in the background, and your duties in the middle distance, and your chances to do a little more than your duty in the foreground; to see that your fellow men [and women] are just as real as you are, and to try to look behind their faces to their hearts, hungry for joy; to own that probably the only good reason for your existence is not what you are going to get out of life, but what you are going to give to life; to close your book of complaints against the management of the universe, and look around you for a place where you can sow a few seeds of happiness – are you willing to do these things even for a day,” he asks. “Then you can keep Christmas… And if you keep it for a day, why not always?”
This is a religious community to help you find the lifeline from you to others, to all those downcast and downtrodden, all those like the outcasts that followed in Jesus’ wake all through his too-short ministry. We are lifeline to all these. This is a season for lifelines: to you and from you. This is a season for taking inventory of such things. This is a season to “remember that you are all people and that all people are you.” This is a season to avoid going it alone. This is a season to step out of the isolation booth. This is a season of lifelines: to you and from you. “Are you willing to do these things even for a day? Then you can keep Christmas. And if you keep it for a day, why not always?”