The Story of Our Labor

Pastor Anthony preaching on “The Story of Our Labor.” Scripture focus is Luke 5:1-11. Preached on September 5, 2021.

Copyright 2021 by Rev. Anthony J. Tang and Desert Mission United Methodist Church.

Earlier this year, on Wednesday, March 17th, Dick Hoyt died at home from ongoing heart issues at the age of 80. (http://www.croswellfuneralhome.com/richard-e-dick-hoyt-sr/)

Now, you may not know Dick’s name off hand, but hopefully you know his story. With his son Rick, they were the father-and-son athletic team that, together, competed in over 1,100 athletic events, which included 97 half-marathons, 72 full marathons, 32 of those in the famous Boston Marathon, and in 257 triathlons, seven of which were Half Ironman distances and six of which were full Ironman distances. And, in case you’re not familiar, a full ironman is a 2.4 mile swim, a 112-mile bike ride, followed by a marathon run of 26.2 miles. And, if that’s not enough, they also biked and ran across the United States, covering over 3,700 miles in 45 days. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Team_Hoyt)

Oh, and I forgot to mention, Rick, the son, has cerebral palsy from birth, is severely paralyzed, and generally communicates with the help of a computer. So, when they’d swim together, Rick would lie on his back in an inflatable raft while Dick would pull it by a rope; they had a special bike made so that Rick could ride in the front while Dick pedaled from the back; and for the run, Dick would push Rick’s wheelchair. I think we have a picture to show you of them:

(https://www.passiton.com/inspirational-sayings-billboards/16-devotion)

All of this goes back to when Rick was a teenager and Dick was 36. Rick had heard about a lacrosse player at school who had become paralyzed and he asked his dad if they could participate in the 5K benefit run because Rick wanted to show that life went on no matter your disability. At that time, Dick had never even run a mile before, but he did it for his son and when they crossed the finish line, Rick had the biggest smile on his face. Once home, Rick wrote on his computer, “Dad, when I’m running, it feels like I’m not handicapped any more.” (https://teamhoyt.com/)

Can you see where Rick got his motivation and his sense of purpose from?

Now, I don’t list off their amazing accomplishments to make all the rest of us feel bad, although I do occasionally chuckle wondering to myself what it must have been like in the last race they competed in, which was the 2014 Boston Marathon.

Now, they didn’t just go for the participate medals. The best time for Dick and Rick as a team in a marathon was only a half an hour off the world record, so they’re fast, they’re really fast.

What was it like for all of those people who were struggling on the marathon course, unable to keep up with the Hoyts, a 73-year-old pushing his 52-year-old son in a wheelchair at full speed.

Some of said that Dick could have been a world class elite endurance athlete if he didn’t have to do the work of pushing for two people. But Dick disagreed. He once said, “I just don’t have the desire to be out there running by myself. I think it’s just something that comes from his body to my body and it makes us go faster. He inspires me and he motivates me and he’s actually the athlete and he’s very competitive. He wants to win.” (https://www.wimp.com/team-hoyt-how-one-father-refused-to-give-up-on-his-disabled-son/)

Again, I don’t bring this up to make us feel bad. I bring up Dick’s and Rick’s story because it’s uniquely theirs and it came to them in the unique circumstances of their lives at the time when both of them most needed to hear from each other. They never set out in life to be endurance athletes. They never intended to create a foundation to inspire others to push the differently abled in marathons and other races. Their only goal was to live their lives. Dick wanted to help his son live as normal of a life as possible and Rick wanted to race and he needed to push his dad to do that. In the middle of that normal life, they received a purpose that inspired and motivated them.

In our scripture for today, we find Jesus near the beginning of his ministry, doing what he did best, teaching others, this time, from the boat of Simon, a fisherman. When he had finished speaking, he asked Simon to put his net into the water for a catch and Simon complains that it’s pointless because they haven’t been able to catch any fish all night. But when he obeys, they catch so many fish, they’re not even able to pull the net into the boat. Simon is afraid and feels unworthy to be in the presence of Jesus, but Jesus tells him, “Do not be afraid, for from now on you will be catching people” and they followed him.

Jesus spoke to them and to their lives and used that experience to help them to see how they fit into God’s amazing plan for them.

Every now and then, when I’m feeling lost or adrift in life, I can find myself struggling to understand what my purpose is. What am I supposed to be doing? Where is my life leading? And the inability to answer these questions can for me and sometimes for others become a very distressing experience unless or until we realize that our purpose is never a concept out there, floating in space that we are expected to go out and find. This is not about finding a destiny. I don’t think Jesus tries to help us find a purpose disconnected from who we are. Jesus connects to our own story, our own lives, and into everything that makes us who we are.

So if we’re really wanting to understand our purpose, if we’re really wanting to understand who we are, it’s not about looking out there, it’s about looking in here. Remembering and listening.

Or by telling our own stories and digging up our past and our childhood, both the nature and the nurture sides of our lives. How do we look at what makes us into who we are? Our genetics, our genes, our ethnicity, our family history, our family story that has been passed down to us, our orientation, our identity, everything that makes us into who we are.

Not just the nature part, but the nurture part as well: how we were raised, the values that we were given, the choices that we made, both those good and bad experiences, both the blessings we have received but also the hardships we have endured. Sometimes they can be so painful that we may think to ourselves, “I don’t ever want to think about that, I don’t ever want to remember those.” But those hardships have contributed just as much to who we are, haven’t they? With courage, with bravery, we have to listen to them and see how God has strengthened us and equipped us to overcome and to continue to live, to get to where we are today. The people we are today is the compilation of everything that has been put into us, our lives, our bodies, our stories, and our choices, which means all of our successes, and our failures too. It’s from our failures that we learn, especially what not to do and what not to say. It’s all of these things are unique to each of us, so each of us has a purpose that is unique and different from everyone else.

We all have a purpose. As long as we are alive, as long as we are breathing, as long as there is energy flowing through our body, we have a purpose. We may be clearer about that in some parts of our lives than we are in others, that’s natural. We may not always know that purpose, but when we listen to ourselves and listen to others, we gain that clarity.

We saw that between Dick and Rick as they listened to each other and discovered their developing purpose. We saw that in the disciples when they listened to Jesus speak to their lives. For us, God may be speaking through the others around us, because our purpose is always connected to a calling of love, how we love others.

As Jesus called the disciples, he wasn’t calling them to one that was better or worse or a calling, just a different calling. He called them from loving and caring for others through nourishment in the marketplace selling fish to loving and caring for the spirits and souls of others. None of us have the same callings.

Not everyone was given the same job. We even know that the Geresene man in Mark 5:18 asked Jesus to let him follow, but Jesus knew that wasn’t his calling, he needed to go home to his friends and share the Good News there.

All of us have different callings. All of us have different experiences. How do we discover that? We listen. We listen to our stories. We listen to what God is saying. We listen to our lives. We listen to those around us, of how we can live into the fullness of who we are, loving others. That’s our purpose.

From your own story, discover the purpose of your life and your work and may we all discover with joy where God is leading us tomorrow.