Imagine and Insomnia

December 5, 2004

Scriptures:

Do you remember the song which John Lennon wrote called Imagine? It’s one of the most popular Beatle songs…in fact one of the most popular songs ever written.

To begin my sermon today I’m going to ask Matthew to play the melody of Imagine through for us. When you hear the melody you’ll remember the song.

(Matthew plays through Imagine)

Well that’s the melody of the song.

I want to share some of the words with you now. 

Imagine no possessions, I wonder if you can,

No need for greed and hunger, a brotherhood of man

Imagine all the people sharing all the world.

Imagine there’s no countries, it isn’t hard to do

Nothing to kill or die for…..

Imagine all the people living life in peace.

Well, these words convey the dreams and hopes of one man about the world that he lived in.

And it has a good melody…it’s a very nice, simple melody.  

But I think the reason it has found such a home with so many of us is because Lennon’s hopes and dreams resonate with so many of our own.

Don’t we all hope and pray for a world where there’s no greed or hunger…where the resources and wealth of the world are somehow equally shared?

And don’t we all hope and pray for a world without violence and war…a world in which mothers and fathers won’t have to wonder if there children will make it back home at the end of the day?

And when we think about things like this, aren’t we always left with this kind of question:

 Will we ever have a world like the one that Lennon hoped for?  

A world without poverty and a world without violence and war?

What do you think?

And here’s a another question that comes to us as we think about things like this:

Is there anything that you and I can do to help create a world like this?

It’s a huge world out there and the problems are nothing short of ENORMOUS.

Isn’t the situation pretty hopeless?

Look at the poverty beginning in our own country.

   Each day in the US 2,171 babies are born 

   into abject poverty   775,415 per year

   Each day in the US 2,455 children are confirmed

   as abused and neglected     895,075 per year

Is there anything that you and I can do to make a dent in this situation?  

Or how can you and I have any impact in bringing peace to the Middle East or Iraq or Afghanistan or to sections in Africa where in one area alone 50,000 people have been methodically murdered?

We imagine just like John Lennon did and we have hopes for our world just like he did………………

Where do we even begin to be a part of an effort to create a world like this?

I think we begin by asking these kinds of questions, 

and by being impacted with the reality that we are our brother’s and sister’s keepers

.

And we begin by understanding what  Martin Luther King Jr. said to us when he said….”As long as one suffers we all suffer.”

And maybe we begin by praying a prayer like this:

Dear Lord, I know that there are millions in the world who live in unimaginable poverty, and I know that in many places in our world men and women are being shot and cut up and burned.

Dear Lord, wake me up about all of this.

Help me to be moved by all of this.

Dear Lord, may I have some passion about all of this.

Can we do anything about creating the world of our hopes and dreams?

I think we can, but I don’t think it will begin until we become so bothered by all of this that we cannot stand it.

Well, in closing I want to say just a word about Insomnia.

Did you know that over 60 million Americans suffer from insomnia, that condition when people have difficulty sleeping?

And of the folks who have insomnia, we’re told that 60% are women…and 40% are men.

Why do you think that is?

Do you ever experience it?

Do you ever wake up at night and you can’t get back to sleep?

All kinds of things can keep us awake.

We have a load of work to do so we worry about it and we can’t sleep

We wonder how we’re going to pay our bills, and we can’t sleep.

We have a fight with a friend or loved one, and we can’t sleep.

We have a fight with someone who means nothing to us and we can’t sleep.

One of our children or a parent or a sibling is going through a difficult time and we can’t sleep.

Our favorite athletic team gets beaten in a big game  and we can’t sleep.

It goes on and on and on.

Maybe there’s going to be some hope for our torn, conflicted, suffering old world when we the people of God in the world begin to lose some sleep about it.

God knows we lose sleep about enough other stuff…

how come we’re not losing sleep over the fact that in place after place after place after place after place, ad infinitem, our human brothers and sisters….women and men and children and the elderly…are experiencing mind boggling pain?

Friends, God’s not going to wave a magic wand and change our world.

God’s not going to say…Abra, Cadabra….and every thing is going to be just fine.

The task of making the world what it ought to be is placed squarely in the hands of us, God’s children.

And if it is ever going to happen, the beginning will probably be when, with our faith and hope and love and joy….we experience some life changing sorrow.

And the people said…..AMEN