Bishop J. Peter Sartain delivered this homily at his farewell Mass June 20 at the Cathedral of St. Andrew in Little Rock.
A minister by the name of James Martin once wrote that being a pastor is like being a stray dog at a whistler’s convention. It’s true. It’s equally true of being a bishop.
You open your ears and hear all kinds of things, notice all kinds of needs. With all your heart you want to respond to each one in the way that will serve people best, one at a time. You find yourself going this way and that, not knowing where to look first or where to start. Then very subtly a temptation comes along: the temptation to think that you have it within your capacity to answer all those needs by yourself. You even think that is what God is asking of you.
I say that is a temptation because St. Paul reminds us that it is not ourselves we preach, but Christ Jesus, and him crucified. The call, then, once the whistles quiet down, is a clear and simple one: to do what we can every day to point people to Jesus, because he is the only one who can answer every need.
All of us, pastors or not, play our part. And as small as we may consider our part to be, it is never insignificant. Every disciple of Jesus is to point people to him. He is the one who hears every cry, even the cry that is never uttered, even the cry that is unutterable.
It is not ourselves we preach but Christ Jesus, and him crucified.
Msgr. Marczuk has been kind through the years not to tell anyone that the first time I celebrated Mass in the cathedral, my feet didn’t touch the floor when I sat in the bishop’s chair. I am rather short, so I have grown accustomed to compensating for my size — but there is only so much you can do to make yourself look tall enough to sit in a large cathedra. The next time I came here, my feet touched the floor, but Monsignor would not tell me what he did to make it work. Whatever he did, he probably has the remains in storage just in case the next guy is tall.
“Ah, Lord God,” I said, “I am too young. My feet don’t even touch the ground.” And he said to me, “Wherever I send you, you will go. See, I put my words in your mouth. It will be I, not you, who is speaking.” Whatever any objections any of us can muster to the demands or requests God makes of us, he always has a ready answer. The answer always points back to him, not to ourselves. It points to his grace, his love and his power.
Whatever the task, we are in fact inadequate for it, but God is not. When he calls us to do anything, he asks that we trust that for his own good reason, he has chosen us. And because he has chosen us, he will bring the work to completion, even if we protest that our legs are too short, that we are too young, or that we do not know how to speak.
He responds, “I know what you are saying, but that’s not the point. The point is that I ask you to undertake this in my name. Remember it is in my name that you are sent.”
It is not ourselves we preach but Christ Jesus, and him crucified.
For some reason, when I crossed the Mississippi River into Arkansas six years ago, I forgot how to tie my shoes. I don’t know why, but I found that my laces were always loose or dangling. I never had that problem before. One day I mentioned this dilemma to an RCIA group at St. Anne in North Little Rock. A man named Paul, who works in a hospital, told me he once had the same problem — not a good thing for someone in his profession. After class he showed me a foolproof method of tying shoes.
“Lord,” I said, “I don’t know how to do these things you have asked me to do. I don’t have the wits or skills to do what you have asked me to do.” The Lord responded, “I know what you are saying, so I will put people in your path who will either show you how or do it for you. They are also working for me.”
“You see, that is the way it works. All of you together are disciples of my Son. All of you together listen to him, listen to the whispers and the whistles and the cries of my people. All of you whom I have called will work together, and you will help one another. In my name, by my grace, you will help me build the kingdom.”
What I have discovered year after year, day after day, is that God is always faithful to his promises. Always. He provides what we need. He is patient with our fears, patient with our inadequacy, patient with our stubbornness. Knowing us better than we know ourselves, he nonetheless sends us forth.
He says, “What matters is not that I send you. What matters is that I send you.”
Tonight I would like to say to you, my friends, that I will always be grateful to God that he sent me to you. You have been a wonderful blessing. That is the way God works. He never sends us any place where we will not be blessed beyond our expectations. So it has been in Arkansas. By sending me to you, God blessed me in ways beyond counting.
He taught me: “It is not yourself that you preach but Christ Jesus, and him crucified. What matters is not that I send you. What matters is that I send you.”
And so he has done once again. To God I give thanks and ask that he bless you all the days of your lives.
