Sermon: Mirror, Mirror on the Wall
Date:
Text:
I Cor. 13: 12
By: Kendall Brown
(Images were projected on the sanctuary screen with this sermon.
Image placement and brief descriptions are in parenthesis.)
(mirror and vase from
ancient
caught my attention and stirred my
imagination. I remember the words from
my upbringing
in the King James Language: “Now we see
through a glass darkly, then we will see face to face."
Other translations – “Now we see in a
mirror dimly…”
There is much truth in both
translations. I think Paul might have
had both mirror and
glass in mind. He was writing to a church that had become a
divided community. In short
it was a small pond with too many big fish
jockeying around to have the whole pond for him
or herself. The mirror would have been a subtle reminder
that some Corinthian over-inflated
egos needed to look at themselves. Those
who were legends in their own minds are called by
the mirror image to explore the mind of
Christ. The glass darkly would have
reminded all
that when we lay claim to ownership to
the whole truth and nothing but the truth and think
that everyone else’s ideas are
insignificant in comparison to our own,
we are a long way from
the truth. The knowledge of the whole truth is beyond
our human experience and capacity.
We can only see through a glass darkly
to catch a glimpse of the truth beyond us.
Paul
reminds the swollen heads in
come in this life to seeing and knowing
the truth.
(Cinderella) The mirror image has found its way into
literature, art and theatre.
When I was looking for this picture of Cinderella in an image search, I made some
interesting finds on the web. One was a stitch work mirror, framing the
saying, “Mirror,
mirror on the wall, I’ve become my
mother after all.”
The mirror played an important role in
Walt Disney’s classic fairy tale, “Cinderella.”
When Cinderella looked into the magic
mirror, her self image was transformed and
offered her hope in a desperate
situation. There she was in her tattered
clothes holding
a rough straw broom. Drearily she
cleaned up her step mother’s home.
Looking into
the mirror as she did hand maiden’s
duties, she saw another image – unbelievable but
yet filled with hope.
(Step sisters) Her step sisters had another experience with
the mirror. They are the
ones who give us that unforgettable
line, “Mirror, mirror on the wall, whose the fairest
of them all.” To their dismay – they can hardly believe
their eyes – they see an image of
their lowly step sister, Cinderella.
The step sisters could have easily been
members of the Corinthian congregation. Like the
Corinthians they couldn’t see themselves
in the mirror because they looked desiring to
see only what they wanted to see. The transformation they needed was not an
outer one.
For them to have seen a more acceptable
image of themselves, they needed first an inner
or spiritual transformation – a little
less living in the fantasy land of their own vanity and
egotism.
Henri Nouwen (Henri
Nouwen) was a
brilliant Catholic theologian in the 20th century.
Spirituality was his field
of interest and life’s work. His book
entitled “Reaching Out”
is a classic on the subject
of hospitality. In that book he
describes the journey one must
take to become genuinely
hospitable and accepting of others. For
him the path to
spiritual maturity – the
path moving towards that distant future point of seeing face to face –
involves steps of
disillusionment. For him, spiritual
immaturity is living in a fantasy
world of illusion mostly
self-illusion. There are different
illusions for different stages of life.
Young people live under the
illusion of immortality. I ran into an
example of this just
this past week in an
newspaper article on teenage driving. Teenagers can be prone to taking
risks that are given
encouragement by the feeling that nothing bad can ever happen to them.
The tragic break through of
that illusion is often by a horrible and even life-changing experience.
The need to grow is not
confined to our earlier years.
Paul in his glass darkly
statement is acknowledging his humble recognition that spiritual
growth is a lifetime
work. Nouwen describes the work with his
idea of disillusionment. He
writes about the illusion of
power and the mistake of thinking that security and happiness
comes through the acquisition of power. Rather it is power
sought over other individuals,
groups or nations, the
illusion of power as a source of security only leads to a constant and
quest for more power.
Nouwen also writes about the
illusion of control. Anyone thinking
they have control
over their lives is living
the la la of a fantasy world. He
describes the illusion of happiness
whether happiness is sought
in the acquisition of power, control, money or things. The
Bible doesn’t talk about
happiness, nor is happiness a Gospel objective.
Joy however is a
biblical goal and to achieve
the depths of that joy requires a mountain of disillusionment
– ie. working through our
fantasies and illusions.
(mirror and glass again) Paul’s
image of the glass darkly or mirror dimly is important
to Nouwen. Our souls are encapsulated in layers and
layers of illusions about ourselves,
others and even god. The layers are like the layers of an
onion. And yes, peeling them
back often requires
tears. But as we peel away each layer,
we advance a little closer to
seeing more clearly the
truth about our selves. It is totally coincidental that I got new
eye glasses this week that I
am preaching this sermon about glass and images. My doctor
told me the other day that
cataracts are a given for everyone. If
you have human eyes
you will have
cataracts. It is only a matter of time
for everyone. We also have eyes of
faith – inner eyes. Illusions are like cataracts on our inner
eyes that keep us from oneness
with God and that contribute to the darkness
of the glass darkly.
(Girl and Mirror by NR) Norman Rockwell’s girl looking in a mirror
was the Saturday
Evening Post cover,
is propped against a chair
in the way that things are stored in attics.
Attics for children
are places of mystery,
wonder and discovery. It was a treat for
me to explore my
grandparents large attics and finding
pictures, letters, old magazines, civil war weapons
and uniforms and much more
that went back more than a 100 years in my own family.
This young girl is
discovering herself. She is playing with
the polarities of childhood a
nd adulthood, reality and
make believe, illusions and disillusions in this picture. And
the play is more than play –
it is an essential part of maturing – most importantly spiritually.
In the corner is a discarded
doll, slumped unattended by the mirror.
Norman Rockwell
has given us a wonderful
image of Paul’s words “When I became an adult, I put away
childish things.” The doll has been replaced by the make-up on
the floor closer to the
young girl. The makeup is an instrument of adulthood. There are many instruments
of adulthood that we all
have, money, marriage, family, careers, choices. The important
question is “Who are we
going to be?” That question is
symbolized by the magazine
opened to a picture of a
movie star on the girl’s lap. The mirror
and the magazine
represent a fundamental
choice in life for all. Will she become
herself as the mirror
gives her opportunity to
see? Will she try to create in her own
life someone else’s
image? It is the choice between ought and may. I ought to do this and this and
believe thus and thus. Or I
may become what God has given me to be.
In Nouwen’s
language, our oughts and
shoulds are more illusions that we lay on ourselves and also
on others.
My daughter as all of your
daughters could easily be the girl in this picture. Hannah
grew up with considerable
pressure in her life that she ought to become a minister like
her father and
grandfather. That pressure is
represented by the movie star’s picture
in the girl’s lap: Someone
else’s idea of who she ought to be and not God’s idea that
she must find for herself
looking at herself through the eyes of faith.
I am happy to be
able to say that the “ought
to be a minister” came from other places in our daughter’s
life and not from her
parents.
There are at least two ways
to exercise parenthood represented in Rockwell’s picture.
There is pressure
parenthood. That style lays an
image, represented by the magazine
picture, before our children
and says to them, “You must become this image, which
is usually the parents’ idea
of who they want their children to become, and often
that idea has roots in the
parents’ own disappointments about themselves.
That is
pressure parenthood filled
with ought, and must, and should. Another
image of
parenthood is in this
picture. It is the image of presence
parenthood. In Rockwell’s
picture the unseen parents,
unseen or not, are very much present to the girl by
providing her a home – what
Nouwen would call a hospitable place - where she can
discover her own self. In this attic picture one can find the
presence of a lot of parental
permission.
I turn now to one more
mirror image from literature. In J.K.Rowling’s Harry
Potter stories there is a
mirror much like the mirror in Cinderella.
It is a magical
mirror. (Harry Potter slide) When Harry discovers the
mirror, he notices others in it
who can’t be there. Most notably, he sees his parents who were
killed at the beginning
of his story. Harry brings a friend to look into the
mirror. When Ron looks into the
mirror, he sees himself
wearing the badge of Hogswarts Head Boy – symbol of an office
for which he has secretly
aspired. On Harry’s third visit to the
mirror, his teacher and
mentor, Prof Albus Dumbledore
discovers him there. Dumbledore warns
Harry about
the mirror.
He tells him the mirror’s name which is “Erised” which is “Desire”
spelled
backwards. The truly happy
person, teaches Dumbledore, can look in the mirror and see
himself as he or she truly
is unencumbered by illusion and uninhibited by desires –
must especially desire for
adulation, security, power and being the center of the universe.
(mirror and glass) Now
we see in a mirror, dimly, or through a glass, darkly. Paul also
knows what is being seen
through the distortions of the glass and mirror. The light
on the other side of the
glass, the light to be seen in the mirror, is the subject of I Cor. 13.
-
love.
We see the light of God’s love the only way we can see it. It is so bright that to
look at it directly requires
a darkened glass just as looking at an eclipse of the sun requires
a darkened glass.
Professor Dumbledore also
taught Harry that it is our choices that define us as we look
in the mirror. Harry learns from his mother. She and his father were killed by the evil
Voldemort. But before she
died, she threw herself in front of Harry thus saving him
in the giving of her
life. The scar on his forehead from the
wound he received in that
moment is a lifetime
reminder of his mother’s self sacrifice and love for him. In the
end Harry learns that love
is the vanquisher of desires, and love is that which is needed
to see ourselves and others
as God sees all of us. Faith, Hope,
Love, the greatest of these is love.