“Exploding Cans”
(of a Thermotic Church)
All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit
and began to speak in other languages,
as the Spirit gave them ability.
(Acts 2:4)
A sermon by Siegfried S. Johnson on the Eighth Sunday after Pentecost, July 30, 2006
First United Methodist Church, 605 West Sixth, Mountain Home, Arkansas 72653
A couple of years ago Nescafe engaged in a unique marketing experiment using technology developed at England’s Southhampton University by Drs. Neil Richardson and Tony Rest -- coffee in a self-heating can, provocatively called, “Hot When You Want.” And that’s exactly what it is. Give the can a quick shake. Press a button on the can triggers the mixing of the elements. You hear a pop followed by a hissing noise, and that means your coffee will be steaming hot in just a few moments. It’s a cup of coffee, Hot When You Want.
Now, to be sure, Nescafe was taking a bit of a risk. In earlier attempts, self-heating cans haven’t exactly earned the best of reputations. First experimented with on the battlefield, British soldiers in World War 2 had cans with a fuse, to be ignited by a lit cigarette (official records say no one was injured). During the Vietnam War the United States Army tried its version of self-heating cans. A solid flammable base heated the contents of the can. Soldiers then speared the can with a small spike to get at the warmed food. Now, to be sure, this looks great in war movies, with jungle scenery, booted and camouflaged soldiers, faces decorated in charcoal. Little question, though, that such a thing wouldn’t work commercially for subway commuters in New York -- women camouflaged with cosmetics from Saks Fifth Avenue, booted in high heels, the New York Times tucked under their arm.
Evidently, the technology must have vastly improved, making self-heating cans safe, reliable, convenient, and tasty. Must have, because Nescafe, no question a major player in the international coffee market, purchased six million cans for a test-market in the British midlands. The technology is simple. Hidden within can is a segment about the size of a shot glass filled with quicklime and water. The button releases the quicklime to mix with water, generating enough energy to raise the temp over a hundred degrees in three minutes!
I must mention another advance in self-heating technology which some of you will have seen or perhaps used -- Proctor and Gamble’s ThermaCare Air-Activated Heat Wraps. The wrap come in an airtight pouch and contains heat disks that, when opened, reacts to exposure to oxygen, producing heat. The wrap heats up in about thirty minutes, and stays warm for eight hours. I picked up a brochure and saw the slogan promoting what a difference heat can make for sore muscles – “Feel the Difference Between Can’t and Can.”
Here’s the point. Wouldn’t it be great if the church had a self-igniting mechanism, a button to push that would activate the mixing of certain elements, thereby elevating the spiritual temperature of the church? What if that flame in our Methodist insignia of the Cross and Flame sparkled with life? Wouldn’t a Thermotic Church be great?
Thermos is a Greek word meaning “heat,” and is the root of many of our heat-related words – thermos, thermometer, thermal, thermostat. Perhaps Jesus expressed a desire for a Thermotic Church in Revelation 3, a message to the Laodiceans, “I know your works, that you are neither cold nor hot. I wish you were either cold or hot. So because you are lukewarm, I will spit you out of my mouth” (precisely the same thing a Londoner would do with “Hot When You Want” coffee, should the can malfunctioned and the coffee arrive at lips lukewarm).
Self-heating technology is all about chemical reactions, the mixing of certain components which releases energy. I love the recently released television commercial produced by Dow Chemical, called, The Human Element. Its debut was on Saturday, June 17, a visually beautiful video, on a par with a National Geographic special, shifting between environmental images gathered from around the world. Referring to the Periodic Table of Elements, the narrator speaks of chemical reactions to the mix of nature’s elements, then it injects into the Table of Elements the most fascinating element of all – The Human Element (HU). Listen to a part of that amazing script:
We look around and see the grandeur of the scheme – sodium bonding with chlorine, carbon bonding with oxygen, hydrogen bonding with oxygen. We see all things connected. We see life unfold. And in the dazzling brilliance of this knowledge, we may overlook the element not listed on the chart, its importance so obvious, its presence is simply understood – the missing element is the Human Element.
And when we add it to the equation, chemistry changes. Every reaction is different. Potassium looks to bond with potential. Metals behave with hardened resolve. Hydrogen and oxygen form desire. The Human Element is the element of change. It gives us our footing to stand fearlessly and face the future. It is a way of seeing that gives us a way of touching. The Human Element. Nothing is more fundamental. Nothing more elemental.
For this excellent commercial, the Human Element is the quicklime that warms the cold earth and releases an energy of spirit – potential, resolve, desire, fearlessness, and compassion. Once HU is introduced, everything changes.
I want, however, to suggest that a prior and more powerful “Element of Change” is God’s Spirit (SP). We’ve read this morning of the Spirit’s work at Creation (sparking the cold elements of the world with life) and at Pentecost (sparking the infant church to new life and energy). I know of no better way to comment on Genesis 1 than to use my prayer shawl, what the Hebrews call, Talith (little tent). Sherry purchased this one for me as we walked the Via Dolorosa of Jerusalem’s Old City five years ago. In the famous prayer embroidered into the fabric, “Blessed are you O Lord, our God, King of the Universe,” one senses the cosmic and universal imagery of the shawl.
When the Hebrew worshiper pulls the shawl over their head, they begin to rock and sway. Let me explain why. The shawl is a symbol of the Spirit Element being introduced into a cold, dead world. This element, (SP), is the element of change. Once introduced, we see all things connected. We see life unfold. Listen again to Genesis 1: “In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth, and the earth was without form and void, and darkness was upon the face of the deep.” Here is the image of a cold mix of elements without the spark of life. Genesis continues, “And the Spirit of God moved over the face of the waters.” The word “moved” (Hebrew: marhephet) is variously translated as brooded or hovered. Both are good, and one can see both symbolized in the “hovering” of the shawl over the worshiper.
I prefer, though, the translation, “energized,” or “sparked.” The SP element is seen in the shawl as a canopy settling over the unformed earth, energizing the cold, dead mass of elements, warming it and setting to spinning the primary elements of life. This spinning movement is inherent to life, whether on the micro level of atoms and electrons and the double helix of our DNA, or the macro level of the arms of the Milky Way -- spinning is the motion of life. To wear the shawl is to symbolize this life-giving Presence, such a powerful symbol that the one praying begins to rock and sway.
We also read from Acts 2, the Day of Pentecost when they were all together in one place (as we are this morning in our combined worship). The church was listless if not lifeless, but the introduction of the SP element changed everything, infusing the church life and motion so that the book in which Pentecost is recorded is called Acts. Here is action, movement, swirling outward from Jerusalem to Judea to Samaria and throughout the world.
Is this not what John Wesley experienced, when he speaks of that moment on Aldersgate Street when his “heart was strangely warmed.” Something acted as quicklime to his soul, warming his spiritual energies in a way that never abated. What is the quicklime element for you? For some here, the best quicklime to raise your spiritual energy is the contemporary music of the Praise Band. Others are stirred more by the choral and traditional, forms of worship. For me, the surest quicklime agent is mystery and ritual, silence and meditation, the sacraments and the truths they possess and impart in image. Whatever the quicklime is for you, it is good for us all to come together in one place, and to experience together the single element that binds us together as the ChristBody – the Spirit Element.
One concluding note. The Jewish Prayer shawl speaks of the Spirit as external, the Spirit hovering over the deep – a precious and powerful symbol of Presence and mystery. Here is a significant contrast for Christians. We have an internal source. We don’t need a shawl to symbolize external presence, but rather are possessed with the indwelling Spirit. In other words, the church has a self-heating mechanism already in place!
Remember the slogan? “Feel difference between can’t and can.” I suppose it would be accurate to say that the Thermotic Church is one that feels the difference between Can’t and Can. The things we once thought beyond us to accomplish, now enter the realm of possibility. As I suggest in the sermon title, the Thermotic Church should be known by its Exploding Cans. I’m not talking about metal cans, of course. I’m talking about our attitudes. Our sense of Can’t and Can changes once (SP) is introduced. Nothing is more fundamental to the church. Nothing more elemental. In the words of our text, the Spirit Element “gives us another language,” a language of the Spirit’s ability rather than our own. I’m not speaking about “tongues” here, but rather about a new language of possibility and hope and vision -- a language of Exploding Cans in the Thermotic Church, our possibilities broadened, our vision emboldened.
Sources and notes:
“Good News for those Without Two Sticks to Rub Together: Self-Heating Cans Being Tested by Nescafe Is Called Reliable – Unlike Exploding Predecessors,” by Sarah Ellison in The Wall Street Journal (April 26, 2002).