LEARNING TO LIVE WITH AN AUDIENCE OF ONE - BY REV. BILL DICKSON

Ash Wednesday, 2004 Learning to Live with an Audience of One Rev. R. William Dickson St. John the Divine, Houston, TX

Introduction: There's a quip about public speaking which I have always found quite startling and provocative. It goes this way – "The first thing an inexperienced novice speaker does upon being invited to speak somewhere is to inquire about the topic –"What is it I am to talk about?"; but the first thing a really expert speaker asks is 'Who is my audience?" It is simply impossible to communicate effectively without giving some serious consideration to the matter of your audience. You dare not address a group of fourth graders as you would a group of mature adults. It would be quite wrong-headed to address a gathering of scholars the same way you would speak to a group of blue-collar workers. You cannot communicate effectively without considering your audience. I doubt that anyone who has ever spoken publicly or anyone who has ever thought carefully about the task would dispute it. It is certainly true.

But I wonder if we have given adequate consideration to the critical importance of the audience of our lives. Before whom are we really living our lives? Who is the true audience before whom our time on the stage of life is performed? In our gospel text for today Jesus suggests there are but two options, and only one is acceptable to those who would be his disciples.

[Sermon continues with full theological reflection on living before God as our primary audience, including discussion of spiritual "gyroscopes" and concluding with an Ash Wednesday meditation]

Amen.