Freedom from Captivity
Faith=Belief=Action

The other Sunday Jean Lee preached a thought-provoking sermon, "From Slavery to Freedom," in our Ttransformation Series. She was followed by Ngiam Su Lin who gave the meaningful message in observance of International Women’s Day. Then last Sunday our dear Clarence gave as expected another provocative message. I am not sure what effect they all have upon you. For me, I was captivated and have not been freed from reflecting upon them. I had this sermon prepared earlier and after last Sunday I found that I had to unpack and re-shape it.
I was asked to launch a new sermon series on the Psalms which essentially are the songs and lamentations of the faithful Jews in worship. They deal with all sorts of situations and all kinds of conditions where people, believing that they are God’s Chosen, find themselves in an earthly pilgrimage. Each preacher will choose his or her own favorite Psalm and may I suggest that you choose with the liberation motif in mind. The Jewish race focused on their history as a nation and as individuals of the life of freedom from their bondage in Egypt and their continuing journey till today to the Promised Land. Paul as a Jew himself linked the salvation history of the Gentiles with that of the Jews who followed Jesus. Christians from around the world were likewise connected. History has also recorded the spiritual struggles of the faithful in other religious communities and in other times and contexts. Each in its own way is engaged in the process of transformation and the struggle for liberation for its followers. God is at work with all people throughout human history.

You will remember that Jean began her sermon with the stirring song "I Want to Break Free." It is a new song for me but I was struck by it. Susan alluded that my song of freedom is more likely that of "Born Free." Not quite! When Andy Williams renders it the song comes across as a romantic ballad about lovers. The image that comes to me is often a pastoral scene with animals roaming freely in the wild and birds flying around and not confined to their cages. The gay community can also see the lyrics and can apply it to their breaking out of their closeted situation. Look at it from the gay perspective:

Born free, as free as the wind blows
As free as the grass grows
Born free to follow your heart

Live free and beauty surrounds you
The world still astounds you
Each time you look at a star

Stay free, where no walls divide you
You're free as the roaring tide
So there's no need to hide

Born free, and life is worth living
But only worth living
'cause you're born free

Jean Jacques Rousseau, the 18th century liberal philosopher, reminds us that "Man is born free, but everywhere he is in chains." Gay as well as straight people have their different forms of captivities. For instance, we are tied to our racial heritage, glued to our gender and chained to our economic condition and we are unable to get out of them.

In the Civil Rights struggle period in the fifties, I was in seminary training in the United States and was moved as many were in those days, by the freedom song of the Blacks, "We Shall Overcome."  Read this too from the gay perspective:

1. We shall overcome
We shall overcome
We shall overcome some day
Chorus:
Oh deep in my heart
I do believe
We shall overcome some day
2. We'll walk hand in hand
We'll walk hand in hand
We'll walk hand in hand some day
3. We shall all be free
We shall all be free
We shall all be free some day
4. We are not afraid
We are not afraid
We are not afraid today
5. We are not alone
We are not alone
We are not alone today
6. The whole wide world around
The whole wide world around
The whole wide world around some day
7. We shall overcome
We shall overcome
We shall overcome some day

In the religious world, the message is drummed into us that we are born in sin and doomed to do evil. For the Sunday Jean Lee preached, she had suggested to Gary to “let it fly” with appropriate music and he grasped that chance and jumped and danced to the rousing Hillsong of breaking free and dancing which rocked this stage and almost brought the house down. Lots of sound and fury signifying sin and dancing freely.

My freedom song is actually a little more sedate, a classic evergreen from Les Miserables of the French Revolution for Liberte, Equalite and Fraternite. "Do You Hear the People Sing." This is my song of freedom and liberation for we do not want to be slaves again. We are being challenged to join in this struggle for freedom or war of liberation in our own context. Again sing it with the battle of gay liberation in mind.

Do you hear the people sing?
Singing the song of angry men?
It is the music of a people who will not be slaves again.
When the beating of your heart echoes the beating of the drums,
there is a life about to start when tomorrow comes.

Will you join in our crusade? Who will be strong and stand with me?
Beyond the barricade, is there a world you long to see?

Then join in the fight that will give you the right to be free.

Do you hear the people sing?
Singing the songs of angry men?
It is the music of a people who will not be slaves again
When the beating of your heart, echoes the beating of the drums
There is a life about to start when tomorrow comes

Will you give all you can give, so that our banner may advance?
Some will fall and some will live,
will you stand up and take your chance?
The blood of the martyrs will water the meadows of France.

CHORUS:
Do you hear the people sing?
Singing the songs of angry men?
It is the music of a people who will not be slaves again
When the beating of your heart, echoes the beating of the drums
There is a life about to start when tomorrow comes

Here we have the sense of urgency, the sense of militancy, the sense of victory. We are all in various types of slavery and different forms of captivities and especially for the GLBT community, the gender and sexual orientation issues. Do we want to stand shackled on the sidelines? "It is the music of a people who will not be slaves again… Then join in the fight that will give you the right to be free."

I have an ongoing conversation moving towards consensus and never closure with conclusions particularly with Lawrence, Foo Keong, Jean Lee and Peter. We need to be always open to new insights, new revelations and new promptings of the spirit of God. We talk about freedom, faith and sexuality relating to the nature of the gay Christian lifestyle. What is our common vision of the mission of Free Community Church? What are the moral values that we are to promote? What is the shape of our sexual ethics? How do we minister to LGBT who find here a welcome and a safe haven. How do we equip them to go out into the world which is so conservative and so homophobic?

Do we hear the cries of the thousands here beyond the hundreds that we are in touch and what is our responsibility to them? The distinctiveness of FCC is to minister to the gay community and how our interpretation of the Bible and perspectives of the Christian faith help to reconcile religion with sexual orientation and the development of a gay Christian lifestyle. The inclusivity is not so much the conversation of liberals with fundamentalists which exist in every church but the inclusion of the gay point of view in theological discourse which is excluded in the vast majority of churches.

Much of our theology in our churches is dominated by the middle-class affluent, Western white, patriarchal and hierarchical culture. If you are not aware of it then you are not interested in inclusivity. Doing theology requires the dialogue of racial, economic, gender and gay perspectives.

I am not convinced that the gay issue will no longer be with us any time soon. LGBT persons are born every day by straight people. Hopefully there will be less homophobic people around. I don’t believe that FCC will no longer be relevant since more churches will be gay affirming. We have to wait and it is going to be a rather long one. I am quite sure that unfortunately it will remain an issue here in not only in the present generation but also in generations to follow. Like the poor, gay and lesbian people will always be with us.

About forty years ago after the Civil Rights movement, the gay liberation movement appeared on the church scene. In my last participation in the General Conference of the Methodist Church in the United States in 1972 when I was part of the religious establishment sitting with the seventy odd bishops on center stage, the issue prevailing then was black racism. Progress was made but it has not been resolved and race is still an important factor as evidenced in Obama’s campaign for political leadership today. Black churches are still around.

This year I will be at the General Conference joining Soulforce of Mel White as a volunteer to take part in the demonstrations lending support to the Methodist LGBT caucus group in raising the consciousness of the world-wide Methodist Church the need to affirm the gays. I will be part of the marginalized community and sitting up in the balcony. I will be condemned by the 60% of the official delegates of a thousand. Starting in 1982 with 2 gay affirming Methodist congregations they now have 233 in 2007. They still have around 50,000 churches which regard homosexuality as incompatible with the teaching of the Church.

For some time to come LGBT people in the US and more here will be kept in bondage, You are forced into your closets. You become angry men and women. Will you join this crusade to climb over the barricades and break down the walls and be free again as you were born free? The battle is continuing.

I want to highlight some of what I believe to be the key ideas of the sermons of Jean and Su-Lin that lead to gay liberation. Then I want to relate them to my favourite Psalm 139.

Jean raised the point about false self and true self. The word is honesty in looking at ourselves and coming to terms. The one word that came to my mind is that of honesty when Mel White was asked the question of sexual ethics.

Analyze the nature of our captivity. You have been brain-washed or conditioned by church and society to believe that homosexuality is a sin or fallen nature. For the Bible says so is the constant refrain. And you believe in the Bible and the teaching of the Church and try to be faithful.

The Church also teaches you often about a God who is vindictive, poised to pass judgement and mete out punishment. My erstwhile colleague George Wan tells me that he is willing to preach in FCC and if invited, his message is definitely "Repent." He and others like him demand that you must repent and change your sexual desires, abandon your same-sex urges and even deny sex totally.

We talk more about the fear of God than the love of God. And this God needs to be placated by our praises rather than worship with clean hands and a pure heart as in Psalm 24:4 or in the prophetic teaching of Micah 6:8 of coming to worship which requires us to do justice, and to love kindness and to walk humbly with your God. Who is this God whom you praise and worship? You succumb to the onslaught. To protect yourselves you put on the masks

You trap yourself in the closet. Closets are both inner and outer realities. The outer is harsh. The inner is many times more brutal. Liberation from the inner closet is liberation - the basis of hope in spite of outer circumstances.

We need to be freed from our imprisonment.

You just have to come to terms to this and someday you must overcome and be proud and gay. You have to break down the walls of your closet and climb over the barricade of prejudice and be truly free. It is the continuing mission of FCC to set you free. How do we go about doing it?

Then Su Lin brought up the question of faith and belief. Faith is seen in the life of persecuted women in the Bible in a very patriarchal community. You yearn for a personal transformative encounter with Jesus; you want a faith experience to establish a relationship with God through quiet time, praise and worship. Faith is depicted in the Bible as the Burning Bush of Moses, the Damascus Road of Saul/Paul and history tells us of the leaders of the Christian movement like John Wesley of a heart-warming experience.

So with great expectation and passion we seek for that conversion when we can confess we have met God or Jesus in our lives. We look for confirmation. We were told about such signs and wonders. We desire the born again experience. Yes, but we need to be born again and again. To some it happened and for most, the transformation takes place so quietly in the up close and personal relationship with God. It is not a once off event but a continuous process.
Jean gave me a new book to read about Mother Theresa whom the Roman Catholic Church is in the midst of making a saint. But her life as revealed in her secret letters to her spiritual directors is a life of dark nights of the soul which turned out to be a life-long cry to God "Come Be My Light" and is the title of the book.

Let me quote from one of her letters. She confessed to her spiritual director that within her heart "the silence and the emptiness is so great that I look and do not see, listen and do not hear." In a 1955 note she remarked, "The more I want Him, the less I am wanted…Such deep longing for God—and…repulsed— empty—no faith—no love—no zeal." In one of her letters, addressed to Jesus, she wrote, "Lord, my God, who am I that You should forsake me? …I am told that God loves me, and yet the reality of darkness & coldness & emptiness is so great that nothing touches my soul."

But she also recounted in one interview her first patient: She had started off with one companion and a borrowed apartment. After a course in nursing, she went out, picked up a dying man from the gutter and brought him home to her apartment. In those nearby slums she could easily find old people dying in the gutter, abandoned babies in garbage pails, lepers thrown out by their families and other such rejects of society. She remembered that first day: "Such a beautiful day . . . to meet Christ face to face in the poor. He was there -- the hungry, the sick, the naked Christ -- and the thought of Him in this distressing disguise gave me great joy, peace and strength."

In another quote, Mother Teresa speaks of one's final judgment:

"At the hour of death, when we come face to face with God . . . we will be judged on love . . . on how much love we have put into our actions . . . and not how much we have done. We cannot see Christ to express our love for Him, but we can see our neighbor and do for her/him what we would do for Christ."

Contrary to common perception of her spiritually, she was in spiritual darkness privately. In spite of that she soldiered on. Regarded as the Saint of Darkness she brought light to the suffering people and encountered Christ in the face of the suffering and dying from the streets of Calcutta.

The nature of our encounter with Christ varies with the people. Because we look for traditional signs we are missing Him. We tend to think that we are in darkness when the signs do not appear as expected. God is always present with us and the problem is that we fail to discern the Divine Mystery and Holy Presence. This is how Psalm 139:7-12 describes the omnipresence of God with the Psalmist asking Himself or Herself:

Whither shall I go from thy Spirit?
Or whither shall I flee from thy presence?
If I ascend to heaven, thou art there!
If I make my bed in Sheol, thou art there!
If I take the wings of the morning
and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea,
even there Thy hand shall lead me,
and Thy right hand shall hold me.
If I say, "Let only darkness cover me,
and the light about me be night,"
even the darkness is not dark to thee,
the night is bright as the day;
for darkness is as light with thee.

If faith is a personal experience or encounter with God what then is belief? Belief is seen here as what we know about the nature of God. What do you really believe about God and how does God relate to us and the world around us? In the beginning there is God and this statement affirms that God is the Creator of all that exists around us including human existence.

When I am being queried about miracles and signs and wonders, I look at myself as a living miracle and sign of the wonderful creative power of God. I live only by the grace of God. See how you and I were conceived and born into this world. Again I can resonate with my favorite

Psalm 139:13-14:
For thou didst form my inward parts,
Thou didst knit me together in my mother’s womb.
I praise thee, for thou art fearful and wonderful.
Wonderful are thy works.

Job gave a more graphic description in 10:11-12 "Thou didst clothe me with skin and flesh and knit me together with bones and sinews. Thou hast granted me life and steadfast love; and thy care has preserved my spirit." My God is our loving and caring Creator. This is my belief. We have to affirm this again and again.

How do we see our religion and how do we deal with suffering? Alex Au has posted in Fridae his movie review of "Secret Sunshine." This was voted the Best Asian Film this year and it depicts the role of religion in a Korean family when tragedy strikes. It portrayed the difference between a faith that informs and a faith offered as a crutch. To survive we are in desperate need of informed belief.

Finally, what is freedom all about? Jean defines salvation but a freeing from all that is false about ourselves, from our self-centered, self-destructive ways. It’s a freeing for God’s intended purpose for each of us. Su Lin identified our need to be constantly aware that we are called to fulfill God’s purposes, and we all have a vocation. This is a divine calling that gives meaning to life and human existence on this tiny planet earth.

It is easy for us to understand what we are to be freed from but it is harder to accept that we are free for the vocation to fulfill God’s purpose. The Church Fathers as well as others have drawn the distinction between freedom from and freedom for. "Freedom from" refers to freedom from sin, selfishness, injustice, need, pride, hate…"Freedom for" calls for freedom for love to all, for service to community, and communion with God.

Paul taught the Corinthians "For though I am free from all men, I have made myself a slave to all." (I Cor. 9:19). Again in Galatians 5:13 "For you were called to freedom, brethren; only to do not use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh, but through love be servants of one another." Paul continues on to say that the whole law is fulfilled in one word, ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’" Paul ends this message of freedom with the warnings about the catalogue of sins or work of the flesh and contrasted it with the litany of virtues or works of the spirit. We are free to love and work out our salvation with fear and trembling.
Faith, Belief, Action do not come sequentially. Each is always "Work in Progress." We do not concentrate exclusively on any one of them alone. We must incorporate concurrently into our lives all the three dimensions of faith and belief and action. It is a dynamic relationship and constant interaction. One influences and informs the other two. We just cannot develop a personal relationship with God first and then study and develop our beliefs about God. When we have faith and/or belief then we will proceed to love. It is in the process of serving that we more fully come to know God and it is in serving and/or knowing God that we have an experience of relationship with God.

Believers do not claim to know God with absolute certainty. That is why we are seekers and believers. We are continually seeking and continuously believing. To be a believer means that even though I do not know completely, I have to act on the basis of what I know momentarily.
Believers, no matter how devoted and spiritual, cannot experience God’s presence on a constant basis. There are the dark nights of the soul and a terrible silence. We see darkly or dimly and have flickerings of things spiritual and with that we live and have our being. That is why we are to engage all the time in the struggle for freedom and liberation. A news commentator of Obama’s recent speech on race quoted the great French sociologist Emile Durkheim who wrote the major classic work "Elementary Form of Religious Life" with this statement "we live our lives in the realm of the profane, punctuated by moments of sanctity, only to return again to everyday life."

Psalm 139 ends:
Search me, O God and know my heart!
Try me and know my thoughts!
And see if there be any wicked way in me,
And lead me in the way everlasting.
Religion is essentially a way of life. The heart of faith and spiritual experience, the thoughts of belief and study, the way of life and action are intertwined. May God continue to enrich our faith, enlighten our belief and empower our action to the point in which we can say with Martin Luther King in his sermon "I Have a Dream" the words of the old Negro spiritual:
Free at last, free at last,
Thank God Almighty, I'm free at last.
Amen .