Sermon: Every Small Action (with the story of the woman who broke the alabaster jar), August 11th, 2024

 Sermon: Every Small Action

Last Sunday’s sermon title was Same as Ever. This week’s sermon title is Every Small Action.

 

(Show the 30 second video) This is where I started writing today’s sermon: at Cadboro-Gyro Beach. While sitting on a bench, looking at children playing, geese and yachts, houses, sand and logs, I asked the same Question of the Day which I asked last Sunday: What’s not going to change in the next 10 years?  

After a short time sitting at the beach, I started to walk on the shore. Then, I was reminded of the recent summer I spent in Korea and recollected my childhood memories. Truthfully, over the past ten years, I was almost scared to visit Korea because the Korean summer weather had changed so much. When I was in middle school, I could hold a white ice cream cone in my hand, slowly savouring it before it melted, as I climbed a hill under the bright August sky filled with fluffy white clouds.  

To compare it with the summers in Korea now, on cloudy days, I feel like a goldfish in a steamed glass bowl. On sunny days, I feel like a red-hot baked Korean chili pepper under the scorching sun. It’s so hot, too intense, and so humid that the thought of having to visit Korea in the summer fills me with dread. Even right before going to Korea this summer, when people would say, “You must be so excited to go to Korea!” I’d respond, “Actually, I’m scared.” Some of you might remember my response.

Having traveled back and forth between Korea and Canada every 2-3 years over the past 17 years, continuously experiencing the dramatic changes in weather and climate, “weather” has become for me a theological or spiritual subject. In the era of climate change, which is incrementally and irrevocably only getting more intense, could we find anything that will remain unchanged in the next 10 years? 

One day this summer, I was contemplating something and then found myself doing a wordplay. I broke down the Korean word for ‘weather’, which is Nal Ssi, as Nal plus Ssi. Nal means day, and Ssi means seed. So, Nal Ssi, put together, means that weather is the “seed of the day”, or “the grain of the day” or “shape or condition of the day.” As ssi means something fundamental, essential, or foundational, like “seed” or “grain”, the Korean ancestors understood that, especially in the agriculture-formed landscape and their agricultural lifestyle, the weather is the fundamental condition, shape, the seed that forms their day. This wordplay, breaking down the familiar Korean word that means weather, provides me with an insight I hold to my heart. It’s not my ego, desire, greed, despair, dread, dream, or anything like that which is the seed of the day. I will start the day with the weather. If the weather is the seed of the day, I will watch it attentively, with clarity and understanding, catching the subtle changes and nuances, and will interact with the environment, the surroundings under the weather, adaptively. Perhaps in the world and in our lives, where the physical or spiritual weather is constantly changing, what we could appreciate is learning resilience and what that concept means to humanity. 

The way I understand resilience is that it’s not about fighting against changing weather, nor is it about passively allowing changing weather to completely alter our lives. Rather, it’s about growing and nurturing the flexibility, the quiet power of adaptability, to clearly see and accept things as they are, even as the “seed” or the condition of the day. It’s the ability to comfort oneself, find joy even in adversity, and fundamentally it is to be able to do the right thing in the right moment. Thus, what I would like to submit to you, today, as “Same as Ever" from a Gospel’s perspective, as “What never changes” in a changing world, is the ancient wisdom of “resilience through every small action”, as the seed for our hearts to live in the seed of the day, the changing weather, physically, spiritually, in an era with climate change and other crises. 

In the Bible, I look at the Sermon on the Mount, the beloved passage that has passed down the ancient wisdom of resilience through thousands of years. This passage’s literary phrasing is structured like this: For example, verse 3, 'Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.' It tells us as if being poor in spirit is the condition for the result or reward—the kingdom of God. But what if we think of it this way? What if God’s invitation is not just about a future result or reward but about living the kingdom of God as a ‘solution’ for today, in the present? 

 Let me explain with the next verse. Verse 5 says, 'Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth.' What if we read the verse in the following way? “Inherit the earth” is not the result or reward in the future, but the solution for today. Live your life now, in the present, in a way that deeply connects you to the earth (“inherit the earth”), because there is wisdom in being meek, and this way of life enhances happiness. Blessed means in other word ‘being happy’ in scripture. 

Shall we read the next verse in the same way? 'Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted.’ Comfort yourself now. Give yourself infinite mercy, love, and consolation unconditionally, in the present moment. Take the time to be mournful about your feelings and the current state of the world. It has God’s wisdom, and this way of life - being able to take time, slow down and mourn the changes in the weather without falling into despair - enhances happiness. These are the qualities of the blessed. 

The solution for the day, for the present time, is resilience through seeking the way of the Kingdom of Heaven here and now.

Be comforted. (Comfort oneself, don’t be trapped in woe);

Inherit the earth. (Make deep, spiritual, emotional connection with the earth)

Be filled. 

Receive mercy; receive forgiveness. 

See God.

Be called children of God. 

Be glad. 

Rejoice. 

In this interpretation, the key to resilience is very similar to the Buddhist wisdom of maitri (mercy). The key to resilience contains and primarily is about the quality of attention you pay to things as they are and the way you love them. 

Maitri is, in English words, loving-kindness. Mercy. Compassion. It is to cultivate honesty, see clearly, and be compassionate toward ourselves. Like mother-love, maitri allows us to truly love ourselves and take care of ourselves, just as we become a loving mother ourselves as we hold ourselves unconditionally. Without loving-kindness for ourselves, it is difficult, if not impossible, to genuinely feel it for others. Hold, and behold, like a loving parent holds their child. And Maitri, seeking the Kingdom of Heaven, as a solution for today, the seed for the heart to live the seed of the day - the weather - is for all of us who have been feeling overwhelmed, scared, already overcome by the large scale of the things that keep changing and frighten us: climate change, human-caused and natural disasters, the pain and hurt in the world, daily struggles to find peace and health in our lives. 

The good news is that the Gospel and other scriptures present the ancient wisdom of resilience, the Kingdom of God, maitri happening through every small action. Like the small stones David flung at Goliath. But mercy, maitri, Kingdom of God stones do not wound; they have subtle, soft qualities such as comforting ourselves and others; making deep connections with the earth, receiving unconditional love, forgiveness, seeing God, being called a child of God, being glad, rejoicing regardless of circumstance. Every small action, with these qualities of the kingdom of God, maitri, joy, is how we nurture the resilience that restores us.  

Adrienne Maree Brown, an activist, author, and social justice facilitator, explores the concept of resilience through the lens of fractals in her work, “Emergent Strategy.” A fractal, in mathematical terms, is a complex pattern where each part has the same essential character as the whole. They are infinitely complex patterns that are similar across different scales.

In "Emergent Strategy," Brown uses fractals as a metaphor to describe how small, seemingly insignificant actions and changes can influence and shape larger  systems.

(As I show the slides of natural examples of fractals. Find the photos in the link here: https://www.treehugger.com/amazing-fractals-found-in-nature-4868776) 

 

1. **Interconnectedness**:

   every small action is interconnected and contributes to the larger whole. In terms of resilience, this means that individual efforts to build strength and adaptability contribute to the resilience of the entire community or system. 

 

2. **Small is All**:

  "Small is all" suggests that the smallest units of change are just as important as larger efforts. In terms of resilience, this means that personal and local efforts to cope with and recover from challenges are crucial to the overall resilience of larger systems, such as communities or social movements.

  3. **Repetition and Patterns**:

   Just as fractals repeat patterns at different scales, resilience involves repeating positive patterns and behaviours and such repetitions strengthen individuals and communities. This might include practices of self-care, community support, and sustainable living. 

 

4. **Self-Similarity**:

   The self-similar nature of fractals illustrates that the qualities that make a small unit resilient are the same qualities that make the larger system resilient. This means that fostering resilience in individuals through empowerment, healing, and community-building directly contributes to the resilience of the entire system.

In the context of social justice, Brown's fractal of resilience suggests that small-scale actions, such as local organizing, community dinner that fights social isolation, personal healing, and community-building activities, are not just preparatory steps but are fundamental to creating large-scale social change.

  

I am starting to learn the importance and confidence in having faith in every small action that builds resilience. 

A few months ago, I met a prophetic woman who wanted to dedicate her life and career for environmental activism through being a civil servant. I was in her garden, and she asked, what is the image of the future I have in mind about the earth.

 

For example, if we look at films depicting the future, more often than the image of a green earth, we see human civilization expanding into space, Earth covered with grey, shiny titanium-coloured technology, or as a desert, as if that’s the way to get through the era of climate change, as if it is the ultimate direction for the human race living on earth. In this context, it almost seems as if we believe that only with massive, expensive, cutting-edge technology costing trillions of dollars we might protect the habitability of Earth. It's as if we believe that renewing a city means only building new infrastructure, more roads, more construction, and spending money on big projects.  

While all of these efforts matter and can contribute to the sustainability of our community and the earth, every small action, traditionally female-elders attached, daily care-work, caring for elders, raising grandchildren, dedication to healing, restoration, the image of a Green Earth and helping hands, feeding the hungry, strengthening the weak, tending-God’s-garden resilience, create the large-scale resilience, like the interconnected, small fractals of maitri, Kingdom of God, resilience, creating one whole universe, in repetition and patterns, Same as Ever, with self-similarity. 

However, I do not mean that the habitual, customary daily actions we do - consciously and unconsciously - without our full attention, are those small actions. The model of “small action” that builds resilience for me is like the woman who broke the alabaster jar and anointed Jesus to mark the journey of where Jesus was going, in an extraordinary ritual. While every other male disciple scorned her, “You are spending money on mourning, where it does not help anyone. In order to effect a change, grand actions are required; your action is not enough”. The woman who broke the alabaster jar was seeking the kingdom of Heaven in the present moment while Jesus was with her; she mourned, and was comforted. She broke the custom. She generously overspilled the maitri, Mother-like love.  

This type of small action, fully charged with human courage and creativity, breaking down customs, WILL remain unchanged, in the next 10 years, in the next 100 years, as long as we are human, and together, learn what humanity truly means and can do, willing to inspire a community with lavish generosity, blessing and multiplying trillions of small mighty maitri acts of resilience.