The Power of Yes

Many of you probably don’t know me—and that’s ok. I’m a librarian here at Valpo University and am also an ordained minister in the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ). I am also a process theologian, which is difficult to explain in detail without pictures and intricate explanations, but at the heart of my understanding of faith and God and Jesus and life is one word: yes. You see—I believe that in every moment of our lives God offers us choices— and we can either say Yes or No. Saying yes to God- leads us closer into relationship with God, with humanity, with each other. The other choice—saying no—leads us away from God, away from relationship with others. It is of course, God’s greatest desire that we answer yes—that way we can grow in our relationships with God and with each other. That is pretty dang powerful.

Tonight I’d like to talk to you about the power of yes.

Who here is a fan of improve comedy? I love improv- Saturday Night Live, Whose line is it anyway, I love Tina Fey and Amy Pohler. I’m not good at it- I get flustered and nervous and forget all the rules, but I do love watching it done well.

In Improv comedy, there is something called the rule of agreement—the rule yes-and. So whenever you’re in a scene and your partner does something—you agree with it, add to it and move on through the scene. You don’t get to disagree or change the trajectory of the scene—you simply agree and adjust and make your contribution. In her autobiography Bossy Pants, Tina Fey talks about this a lot and says “Now, obviously in real life you’re not always going to agree with everything everyone says. But the Rule of Agreement reminds you to “respect what your partner has created” and to at least start from an open-minded place. Start with a YES and see where that takes you.”
That is fantastically good advice—start from yes, and see where it takes you…

So lets take this a step further.

Think about a time when you felt that God was very clearly calling you to do something, or perhaps it wasn’t lightning bolt and rainbows clear, but it was a pretty strong nudge. Did you say yes? Where did it take you?

God and I have had lots of these moments—and I’ll be the first to admit that I don’t always answer the right way. Usually, my first answer is—no. And then it’s something like, “are you crazy?” or “how am I going to do that?” or “are you sure”. Perhaps I’ll add some excuses—“I’m not good enough” I don’t have time. I can’t afford it. I don’t want to! And sometimes, but not always, I end up doing what God wanted in the first place. That was how I ended up in ministry, that was how I ended up in Illinois, and that’s how I ended up here at Valpo. I said yes.
What about you? Have there been those moments? Those little nudges—those calls from God? That little nagging feeling lke you’re supposed to be somewhere or do something? What did you do?

Now, think about this--- What if, every single time God asked something of you, you said yes.

WOAH-

Think about that for a moment. What if EVERY SINGLE TIME God asked something of you, you said yes. That kind of belief, that kind of faith takes a LOT of courage and a whole lot of trust. But if you did—it you did trust God that much and you just said yes-- What would happen?
What if you said yes to serving your neighbor, to helping a friend, to helping a not-friend, to spending time with family, to joining that bible study, to going to worship…

What if you said yes?

You might find yourself on a mission trip. You might find yourself with new friends. You might find yourself at Valparaiso University preaching at a candlelight service. You might find yourself preparing to move cross country.
This is NOT an easy thing… the rule of yes can be very scary.
Think about Noah—who said yes when God said…hey, here’s an idea—why don’t you build a boat?

Or Abraham, who said yes when God said, take your son up the mountain and kill him
Or Esther, when God said, hey, I know you’re just a teenager, but you’re going to save your people
Or Mary, when God said—hey- let’s do this thing where you have a baby who is going to be the savior of the world.
Or Jesus—what about Jesus.

If you are looking for an example of a life lived in perfect yes, Jesus is your guy. Whenever God asked Jesus to do something, Jesus said yes—
He said yes to leaving the family business and striking out on his own with a few followers
HE said yes to dining with thieves and tax collectors and other “questionable” folks
He said yes to 40 days alone in the wilderness where he continued to say YES to god rather than to the temptor
He said yes to healing on the Sabbath
He said yes to raising lazarus from the dead
He said yes- again and again and again to the point of death on a cross…
He kept saying yes.
And what happened? Christ’s yesses changed EVERYTHING. The entirety of Christainity hinges on that one word…Yes. Jesus said yes.
This yes is a powerful thing then. Answering yes can cost you— it can cost you money, friendships, and possibly even your life.

Some of the reminders are a little more sublte—and one of those is in the scripture tonight—the parable of the sower.

God is the sower—tossing out seeds of ideas, seeds of love—seeds of opportunity.
Some fall in the land of no—no God—I can’t, I won’t I Don’t hear you. Rocky soil of no.
Some fall in the land of maybe- Well, maybe I could if…. Maybe if I was brave, maybe if I was smarter, maybe if I won the lottery… choked by thorns of indecision and fear
And some seeds—they fall in the land of yes- Yes I can, yes I will, yes I want to.