Sermon for the Ordination of Sandra Dower

November 13, 2004

St. Luke’s Church, Jamestown, NY

Eric M. Williams

This is a great day!

         It’s a great day for St. Luke’s Church.

                  And it’s a great day for Sandra Nichols Dower,

                           a day she has been preparing for her whole life.

Today is the culmination of decades of faithful discernment,

         and years of formal education and training.

                  In this long and winding road she has received many blessings,

                           and she has also faced many hurdles and obstacles.

Along the way she has been reminded by many people in many ways

         that her lips are unclean,

                  that she is too female, too outspoken, too old.

                           She has faced moments of doubt and disappointment.

But as she has stepped forward in faith and answered this calling,

         as she has faced and overcome these obstacles,

                  she has also been blessed.

Through her study at Bexley Hall Seminary,

         along with her ministry at Grace Church in Randolph

                  and back here at St. Luke’s,

                           she has found strength, encouragement and the ability to keep going.

Parker Palmer tells this story about an Outward Bound experience he had.

After putting on climbing gear he was told to back down a cliff over a hundred feet high by using a technique called rappelling.  In terror he tried hugging the rocks and repeatedly slammed into them with bone jarring force.  “Lean way back,” he was told, “and take the next step.”  And it worked.  He leaned back into empty space with his eyes fixed on the heavens in prayer and began backing down the rock face, until he reached a place he couldn’t pass.  He was told he would have to swing way around it—an impossible concept.  “I knew for a certainty that attempting to do so would lead directly to my death—so I froze, paralyzed with fear.”  After long moments the instructor said, “It’s time you learned the Outward Bound motto….If you can’t get out of it, get into it!”[1]

Sandra’s sense of vocation is something she has never been able to get out of.

         And so today with the support of her wonderful husband David,

                  her family and friends, and her parish family,

                           today is the day when Sandra gets into it,

                                    when she joyfully and humbly says:

                                             “Here I am!  Send me.”

Yet despite all this, despite the fancy invitations you received,

         despite the lovely reception which will be held downstairs,

                  today is really not about Sandra Dower.

Her ordination instead directs us to look upward to God

         and outward to the Church, which is the family of God.

                  For it is her relationship with God and the Church

                           which provides the context for a healthy and grounded ministry.

It is important to remember that when the New Testament speaks of priesthood,

         it does so in only two ways:

                  the high priesthood of Jesus the Christ

                           and the royal priesthood of those

                                    who are baptized into his death and resurrection.

Today Sandra is ordained, set apart, not above the rest of us,

         but as a part of the priesthood of all believers,

                  a fellow servant with a particular role to play.

As a priest her important calling is to a distinctive kind of leadership.

         As she presides, preaches, absolves, blesses and baptizes,

                  she brings God’s people together around the altar

                           and nurtures that sacred community, that royal priesthood.

BUT, we do not and should not therefore expect Sandra to do ministry for us.

         Instead we expect her to be, as the prayer book says,

                   “an effective example in word and action,

                           in love and patience, and in holiness of life.”

So the first thing I want to say is that      today is really about us,

         God’s people, and our ministry together.

                  As Sandra responds to God’s call, as she “gets into it,”

                           we are invited to do the same.

Oh, most of us will not be ordained, but all of us are called,

         called to get into it as we seek to know Christ and make him known.

                  Not one of us here today is too female, or too male,

                           too outspoken or too quiet, too old or too young,

                                    to hear and respond to God’s call.

The second thing I want to say is that today is ultimately about God.

         Today as we celebrate and affirm Sandra’s calling,

                  and as we celebrate and affirm our own calling,

                           we recognize that it is really all one calling—

                                    a call to enter into the holiness of God.

Through a life of prayer and discipleship,

         Sandra and all of us are expected to live up to our calling as a holy people.

                  But that holiness is not something we can create or manufacture.

                           It can’t be bought in a vestment catalogue or a Christian bookstore.

Instead it comes through a relationship with the awesome creator of the universe,

         the God of Isaiah’s vision who sits enthroned in the temple full of incense

                  while seraphs cover their faces and sing “Holy, Holy, Holy.”

We grow in holiness as we turn over more and more of ourselves to God,

         as we grow in knowledge and as we grow in service.

                  But most of all as we ground ourselves in a life of worship and adoration.

One of the things I love about Sandra is that she gets this.

         Christianity is not about what you do;

                  it’s about who you are and whom you worship.

Yes, holiness of life involves doing more for others;

         yes it involves personal growth and fulfillment,

                  but holiness comes ultimately from hanging out in the smoke filled temple,

                           from covering our faces and singing “Holy, Holy, Holy,”

                                    from allowing the angel to touch our mouths with the live coal.

Holiness means learning again and again that God is in charge,

         learning that life is not about doing our own will,

                  but about doing the will of him who sent us.

And so today, Sandra, in the name of God,

         we here today, as representatives of the Church prepare to send you.

                  Please stand for your charge.

Sandra, as you begin this new chapter of your life and ministry,

         don’t forget or diminish all that has come before.

                  God has need of and will use everything you have been and done.

Like the old dresses and drapes my great aunt made into family quilts,

         all of your experience is necessary and important

                  as God reworks it into something new.

“Keep on doing the things you have learned and received….”

         Keep caring about the vulnerable ones in our community,

                  and keep calling us to do the same.

Keep challenging us to be our best selves—

         people of generosity, compassion and justice.

Keep inviting us to be people of prayer.

         As you model that life for us,

                  help us to grow into a community that really prays.

Finally, rejoice in the Lord always.

         As you well know, Christian leadership has its ups and downs.

                  Hang on to the joy that you feel today

                           and with which you are positively glowing.

                                    Help us always to be a people of joyful worship and service.

And now may God bless you abundantly.

         On behalf of all of us here, let me say how much we love you,

                  admire you and are grateful for you,

                           and how proud we are of you.

                                    Wherever life and ministry takes you,

                                             you will always be our friend and now our priest.

410 North Main Street, Jamestown, New York 14701

Phone (716)483-6405 * Fax (716)483-6406 * stluke@madbbs.com