Ephesians 1:11-23 "The Eyes of Your Heart" Scott Hoezee

Most Mondays the New York Times devotes a page to fashion. Most weeks this comes after some major fashion show that unveiled the latest designs. Although there is always a kind of review article, the page itself is dominated by full-color photographs of the models who walked down the runway to show off the new clothing. But over the last ten years, something has changed about those models. Nevermind that often the clothing they wear looks strange. And nevermind the fact that most of these models are unnaturally skinny, easily qualifying for the term once coined by author Tom Wolfe: social x-rays.

No, the striking thing that has changed in recent years is the look on the faces of these women. They are, of course, very beautiful--that's why they were hired as models to begin with. And you assume that these women worked hard to land a big modeling job and must count themselves lucky to have done so. It's a big deal to walk down the runway while the shudders of scores of cameras click-click-click-click at you. But in recent years, from the pages of the Times to the catalogs put out by J Crew, the expressions these models display on their faces convey anything but happiness, anything but feelings of enjoyment.

Let me describe to you what I saw on the October 4 fashion page. There were six photos of individual women modeling an outfit and one larger photo of twelve models all lined up in a row coming down the runway. In every case, the look on the model's face was one of vacancy, emptiness, boredom, and very nearly sadness. The picture with the twelve models lined looked less like a dozen women who had the good fortune to land an important modeling gig and more like a dozen women heading to the gas chambers.

Recently someone observed this same phenomenon in J Crew catalogs and wrote an article about what he termed "designer despair." These models are not looking bored and vacant so as not to distract from the clothes they are wearing. The look on their faces is part of a larger cultural trend that claims despair is cool, despair is "in." It's the cynical despair about everything that comes through in that vulgar show South Park and in the passionless, sulking performances of certain stars in the music industry. Despair is what you feel when you don't know where you've come from and you don't know where you're going. That's what I see conveyed on the faces of these fashion models.

Craig Barnes has labeled the current generation of younger people nomads. A nomad is someone on the road but not going anywhere in particular. Life is all about movement but we are not moving to anyplace because we have no goal, no larger purpose. This kind of aimlessness can be seen in some novels today as well. The postmodern novelist Richard Ford is one example of someone who says flat out that the characters in his books "generally embody the attitude that life is always going to be nasty and probably baffling but someone has to go on slogging through it." Ford also says that the goal of life is this: "All we really want is to get to the place where the past can explain nothing about us."

So what's left? We slog on through a baffling, nasty world. We don't want to be pegged to any identity forged in the past and so trudge onward with no real hope of arriving anyplace in particular. The past is nonsense, the future isn't worth thinking about, and so what remains is the present moment in which we can, at best, distract ourselves. It's no coincidence that this era of despair is the same era when people are being offered cable TV packages that include upwards of 500 channels. It's no coincidence that this era of designer despair is the same time period when the iPod is so popular precisely because it can hold upwards of 1,000 different songs.

People need distractions. So what if it takes the whole evening just to surf through your 500-channel cable selection, at least you won't have time left to reflect on life. And if your iPod has 1,000 songs on it, that's probably 3,000-4,000 minutes of music--if you listened to all the songs back-to-back-to-back without stopping, it would take just over three whole days to hear them all. That's more than enough music to keep yourself from reflecting on life's nastiness and emptiness. But in the end, all these distractions are here for the moment but bring no lasting joy. Despair is in. Nomads are everywhere.

But to you young people leading us in worship this morning as well as to everyone else here, I want to proffer the possibility of moving from being a nomad to a pilgrim. Nomads come from nowhere. Nomads don't want the past to say anything about them because if the past can say something about you, that suggests a certain kind of future, too. Better to keep wandering, better to wallow in despair, better to let the moment define you whatever the moment brings to distract or numb you for a bit. But I don't want you young people or anyone else to be nomads. I want you to be pilgrims.

Because pilgrims know where they are going. Pilgrims know where they are going precisely because the past does identify who they are, the past does say everything about them. Pilgrims avoid despair and journey onward in hope precisely because the eyes of their hearts are opened. This morning Ephesians 1 is God's Word to us, telling us who we are and what that has to say about how we walk as pilgrims, and not nomads, in this life.

We'll begin with what Paul starts to say in verses 11-14. In short order Paul says that as God's people, we were chosen, we were marked with a seal, and so we have a guaranteed inheritance. Those expressions are all in the past tense. This is history and yet, by the miracle of the Holy Spirit's presence in your heart right this very minute, this is one form of history that is never ancient history. Sometimes when someone wants to dismiss something that happened long ago, he may say something like, "Oh will you just forget about that now! That is ancient history and it has nothing to do with what we're dealing with now."

But the Holy Spirit in us makes the work of Jesus as up-to-date as anything in the newspaper this morning. This is your history and my history and our history, and it is for that very reason your and my and our personal story. We are in this present moment the people of God because God so loved this world that he sent his only begotten Son to die for us. He chose us. What a happy thing it is to be chosen for something. If you doubt that, just reflect on a time when you were not chosen. You were not chosen to be on Sally's team. You were not chosen by the math teacher to represent your school in the math competition in Ann Arbor this fall. You were not chosen to be part of the homecoming court. That hurts. But when you are chosen, when someone who has a choice picks you out of the larger crowd and gives you a shot at something big, you feel special. You feel great.

Paul says we were chosen--chosen by God! Verse 13 goes on to say that God's choice means that now we are included, which is another word that bristles with good sensations. Because to be excluded is awful. I sometimes think that there is no scenario more dicey than having a group of three friends. Because you know how it often goes when there are three of you. Sally, Jane, and Jessica are all buddies, but some days and for some reason it's all Sally and Jane such that Jessica is excluded and can only go home and sulk.

In the midst of that sadness, Jessica may think to herself that she won't ever again do that to anyone. But then the next day all of a sudden Jane is warming up to Jessica and guess what even Jessica ends up doing to poor Sally: excludes her. Even when we become adults, there is something about "exclusive clubs" that grates on us. When you're sitting in the coach section of an airliner with your knees up to your chin because the person in front of you just reclined his seat, don't you wince just a little when the flight attendant closes that curtain that separates First Class from the rest of us flying cattle? Isn't there always something about "Members Only" lounges that ticks you off a little?

No one likes to feel excluded. Paul says that because God chose us, we are now included in Christ. We are included in the kingdom of our God in Christ and no one can ever kick us out, treat us as second class, or exclude us ever again. And through all of that we have a guaranteed inheritance. We are going to inherit a life in a kingdom so bright and so grand, we'll never tire of marveling over how wonderful and beautiful it is. And it's guaranteed. It's guaranteed by God and so since it's God doing the guaranteeing, you know this is no ABC Warehouse deal with lots of strings attached. This is no limited warranty. This is not a promise you can invalidate in case you do any one of about fifty-eight things listed in the fine print. God himself guarantees he has a place for us.

So contrary to certain postmodern writers whose goal is to get to the point where the past can say nothing about us, we have in our collective past God's choosing and including us, saving us for an inheritance that cannot be taken away ever. But as Paul will make clear before this passage concludes, this is not just about what has been and it's not just about what will yet be. This is about now, too. That's why in that wonderful verse 18, Paul says that he has a prayer for Christian people everywhere: "I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened so that you may know the hope to which he has called you."

The eyes of your heart. What a lyric phrase. At the center of who you are, you need open eyes that will help you walk in life not as a blank and aimless nomad but as a clear-eyed, purposeful pilgrim. Let's go back for a moment to those images of designer despair I mentioned at the outset this morning: do you know the number one place on a person's face where a vacant, bored, and despairing look comes through better than anywhere else? It's the eyes, isn't it? They say that the eyes are the windows on a person's soul. What you see in someone's eyes tells you so much about what is on the inside of also their hearts.

I read an article last week about the new movie based on the book The Polar Express. As you may know, this is going to be one of the first movies ever fully to translate the movements of live actors into a completely digital, computerized format. Tom Hanks is the star of this film but to transform Mr. Hanks into a digital character, the filmmakers covered his face and his body with motion capture sensors. So when they did any given scene, Mr. Hanks wore a body suit covered with sensors that would pick up on every movement of his arms and legs and then record those in a digital format inside the computer.

His face was also peppered with two dozen sensor dots. But although this process works well, the special effects people are left with a challenge: it is impossible to put motion capture sensors onto a human eyeball. So they had to create the eyes of each character from scratch and try to make them look very real. This was key because, as this article noted, it's the eyes that can make or break how real a digital character looks. If the eyes look glassy or the least bit vacant, then it won't matter how expressive the rest of the face is.

The eyes tell the story. Paul prays that the eyes of your heart will be opened and enlightened so that you may "see" the hope we have, the glorious riches God in Christ has made available to us. Because if you can see all that, you will also see and then sense within your own heart the awesome power of God. The same power that incredibly enough raised Jesus Christ from the dead on that Easter morning long ago is inside you! As we noted together in another sermon, this is like hard-wiring the Energizer Bunny directly to a Consumers Energy substation! The wattage flowing into us is, spiritually speaking, the same power that animates the known universe and beyond.

If the eyes of your heart are open and enlightened, then you know and see and sense all of that. And so to you dear young people as well as to everyone here today, I say again: we are not nomads but pilgrims. Pilgrims know they are on the road, they know they are not home yet, they may even feel a certain holy restlessness with life as it is. But unlike the nomads of designer despair who are cynical over everything and who can do no more in life than be distracted for the moment, pilgrims know where they have come from. Pilgrims know that the past says everything about who we are now and who we will be in the future. We are God's chosen ones, so precious to God that he will eternally include us in Christ and keep steering us in the direction of the great inheritance he has waiting for us.

So pilgrims do not despair despite having a clear-eyed ability to acknowledge that there is much in life that is tough, much in this world that is frightening, much in our society that tempts us to be dour and cynical. But as pilgrims, we know who we are, we know whose we are, and so we know we do not travel alone nor are we merely walking in circles. Pilgrims know they are going someplace and, what's more, it is someplace wonderful.

For you young people, I simply am not sufficiently in tune with the musical groups, the TV shows, or the movies that are currently hot property to be able to get as specific as I'd like. But this morning you've heard me say that I want so much to have the eyes of your hearts opened. I want you to see yourselves as pilgrims who are going someplace special and accompanied by a God who has already given you everything.

So in closing I'll simply make the plea for you to avoid, or at least be aware of and be critical of, song lyrics, TV shows, or movies that seem aimed at fostering despair and cynicism. If a singer keeps going on and on about how every day is "just another day" or about how everything is ever and always the same old thing on and on until you die, don't absorb lyrics like that without realizing that if you are a pilgrim for Christ, this need not be true for you. If a TV show is populated by characters who do no more than lounge around the house, firing off bitter and cynical comments about religion, the church, work, school, politics, or whatever, don't simply laugh at their edgy jokes uncritically.

Realize that even in this tough world, there is yet goodness, there are yet things to celebrate and be positive about, you yourself can make a difference precisely because you have nothing less than the power of God bursting inside you. And even within the circle of your own friends, don't talk to each other in ways that are ever and only flippant. Resist the culture of "Whatever!" by which too many people today flip off and write off whole segments of life. If more often than not you find yourself saying, "Who cares? What difference does it make? Whatever! Yada-yada-yada," then stop yourself at some point and ask if you're talking now like a pilgrim with a purpose or a nomad fixated on despair.

And always remember that you are not alone. God goes with you. Jesus goes with you through his Holy Spirit. And we are all together with you in the community of the church. In a few minutes we are going to say the Apostles' Creed as we now do most every Sunday morning. Have you ever noticed something peculiar about the way we do that? We are reciting, in unison, what we all believe as God's people. Yet as we do this, we don't say, "We believe in God the Father almighty . . ." Instead we say, "I believe in God the Father almighty . . ." We speak in the first person singular as though only one person was talking and yet we are all talking together at the same time.

Do you know why we do that? As a reminder that we are all finally one body of believers in the family of God and as a reminder that we are not in this by ourselves. To be a Christian pilgrim is never to travel alone. The world can be a lonely place. But for you young people and for us all, if the eyes of your heart are opened, you know for sure that you are always surrounded by a great cloud of witnesses and fellow pilgrims. Please carry that knowledge out of here with you today and then travel forward with hope. Amen.