Together with Stubborn Gladness — Acts 1:6-14

My name is David Kind.

I’m a member here at First Church Berkeley, part of the Mental Health and Accessibility Ministry, and also a first-year seminarian at Pacific School of Religion.

And… I have exciting news: This is my very first official sermon.

And let me just say, there’s nowhere else I’d rather be than here, together with you, today.

Today also happens to be Mental Health Awareness day — and the last Sunday of Eastertide.

That means my assignment is to cover super easy subjects like suffering, sorrow, grief, not-knowing, mental health and the Ascension of Jesus.

I’d like to start by saying: Today’s scripture has got to be one of the strangest scenes in the whole Christian story.

Jesus has been crucified, resurrected, and is now making a surprise appearance to the disciples.

That means that at this point in the story—the disciples have already lived through trauma, terror, grief, confusion, and impossible hope.

In today’s language, we’d say they’re struggling with mental health.

Today’s scripture also reminds us how quickly life can shift from peace like a river to waters of chaos.

And I want to stay with that metaphor for a moment—because I think it gives us a better way to talk about mental health.

It’s easy to divide people into one of two categories: people who are fine (enough) and people who really need a therapist (or something stronger.)

But the truth is, we are all at sea—standing at the prow of a small ship.

Some of us are in storms right now.

Some of us are in fog.

Some of us are sailing on waters that are calm today, but we so vividly remember the last storm, we’re not quite ready to exhale.

Some of us can see the stars.

And some of us are desperately looking for true north.

That’s the disciples.

So they ask Jesus the most human question possible:

“Lord, is this the time when you will restore the kingdom to Israel?”

This is Biblespeak for:

“Um, yea, sorry to bother you Jesus, but um, we’re all kind of sort of wondering when you’re going to, ya know, become the Messiah already.

Like, don’t mean to rush you, but like, it’s really hard being us at the moment and we’re definitely super ready for you to make it all better now.”

And I love this because it’s so honest.

And how does Jesus respond?

He basically says, “Guys, haven’t you been listening this whole time?

It’s not for you to know.”

And cryptically, he says that they will receive power—which could have meant a great many things—when the Holy Spirit comes upon them.

Then—before they can follow-up—he ascends into the clouds.

And the disciples just stand there, staring.

Of course they do.

Because what else do you do when the person who held your world together disappears………. again?

They stand there, suspended between grief and hope.

Between resurrection and Pentecost.

Between the promise and the power.

And we know that place.

The messy middle.

On this Mental Health Sunday, I want to say this plainly:

Not everyone carries the same wounds.

But everyone has a bodymind that gets tired.

Everyone has places where fear gathers.

Everyone has old stories that still know how to whisper.

Some of us live with depression, anxiety, addiction, mood disorders, eating disorders, ADHD, complex post-traumatic stress, or even more severe psychiatric conditions.

And even without a diagnosis, too many of us have simply become very, very good at seeming okay.

Church, I worry about that.

I worry about how much suffering gets hidden because people are afraid their honesty will make them less lovable.

So please hear me—

Suffering is not proof that you lack faith.

And needing help is not evidence that you are weak.

It is evidence that you are human.

And if the incarnation means anything, it means God meets us in the messy middle.

Now, notice what happens in Acts after Jesus ascends.

The disciples, they don’t scatter.

They return—to Jerusalem—together.

They go to the upper room together.

And Acts tells us they were “constantly devoting themselves to prayer…together.”

Not certain.

Not fixed.

Not healed.

Just.

Together.

And I think that is the miracle before the miracle.

Before Pentecost, before the bold preaching, before the church becomes the church, there is a small confused and frightened community refusing to abandon one another.

That’s not a small thing.

That may be the whole thing.

Because healing hardly ever is a lightning bolt moment.

Usually, healing looks like people listening and people telling the truth.

And yes, healing also looks like therapy, support group, medication, or telling your doctor the truth.

All these things matter.

Deeply.

And—the church body offers something that does not replace professional care.

The church offers a community where no one has to carry their humanity alone.

That is the part I want us to hear today.

We are not called to be one another’s saviors.

We already have one.

We are called to become a fleet.

No matter who you are, or where you are in life’s journey

You belong in this covenantal, slightly chaotic, Spirit-tossed fleet.

Here’s the thing—

Sometimes, you’ll be the one with strength to row.

Other times, you’ll have a broken sail.

Both of those are sacred.

This is what I love about our church.

We do not have to erase difference to belong.

Our unity is not sameness.

It is covenant.

It is the stubborn decision to remain in relationship while God is still speaking.

And that matters because mental health inclusion is about creating a church where difference is not treated as disruption.

Where neurodivergence is not treated as inconvenience.

Where trauma responses are not mistaken for character flaws.

Where disability is not pushed to the margins and then called “special ministry.”

Where people are only welcomed if they approximate normal.

Normal was never the gospel.

Love is.

Our church is not a collection of people who have figured out how not to suffer.

We are people learning, by grace, how not to let suffering have the last word.

There’s a poem that has taught me a lot about just that—not letting suffering have the last word.

Poet Jack Gilbert writes in A Brief for the Defense that “We must risk delight” and “have the stubbornness to accept our gladness in the ruthless furnace of this world.”

“We must risk delight” and “have the stubbornness to accept our gladness in the ruthless furnace of this world.”

That part undoes me every time.

Because delight really is a risk.

When you have known loss, joy feels dangerous.

So yes, delight is a risk.

The poem tells us to risk delight not because the world is easy, but because the world is not easy.

What an exquisite tension!

Not sorrow or joy.

Sorrow and joy.

Not suffering or gladness.

Suffering and gladness.

And that, to me, feels deeply Christian.

Because our faith does not claim that suffering is unreal.

It claims that suffering is never ultimate.

The crucifixion is real.

And so is resurrection.

Grief is real.

But Pentecost is coming!

What stays with me most from Jack Gilbert’s poem is the idea of “stubborn gladness”

And I love that he doesn’t call it “easy joy” or “abundant glee”

He calls it, Stubborn Gladness.

The kind of gladness that has dirt under its fingernails.

The kind that has survived things.

Now, I want to be careful here because joy can easily become another burden.

We hear “choose joy” and it becomes one more thing to fail at, one more requirement, one more task on the to-do list.

So let me say this clearly: Stubborn Gladness does not mean you have to feel happy.

It does not mean psychosis and hospitalization aren’t real.

It does not mean you have to smile through pain.

— call trauma a blessing.

— be grateful for things that hurt you

— or rush your grief because other people are tired of hearing about it.

Stubborn Gladness is not a mood.

It is a posture of resistance.

It says “We don’t let despair get the last word around here.”

And sometimes we cannot choose Stubborn Gladness alone.

Sometimes the community has to choose it for us until we can once again choose it for ourselves.

That is why this community matters.

That’s why our fleet matters.

Because we’re brave enough to stay.

Because we’re brave enough to say:

You are not too much.

You are not a burden.

You are not your worst day.

You are not your diagnosis.

You are not the thing that happened to you.

You are not alone.

Sometimes, it’s easy to feel like our messiness disappoints God.

Here’s what I know for sure:

What I know for sure is that God doesn’t just love us.

God really likes us.

That sounds almost too simple, but I believe it.

God delights in our still becoming -ness.

And that’s Grace.

Grace is the force that refuses isolation and makes connection possible again.

There is a reason Acts does not tell us that each disciple went home alone to process privately until they felt spiritually ready.

They gathered and prayed and waited… together.

Because the Spirit arrives more often in shared courage than in private certainty.

This is so important for mental health because isolation creeps.

It says:

No one else feels this way.

No one wants to hear this.

You should be over it by now.

You are too complicated to love.

But community tells a different story.

Community says:

“I am just so glad you told me.

Do you want to talk about it?”

And I think that might be one of the simplest ways to practice care.

“I’m just so glad you told me.”

Not because it fixes anything.

But because it interrupts shame.

It tells the person: Your truth did not drive me away.

And then: “Do you want to talk about it?”

Not “Here’s what you should do” or “my cousin had that and she tried magnesium.”

Our community grows strong not when we fix suffering but when we each ask—

First, “How am I creating safety for this person in this moment?”

Second, “How am I showing this person God’s love in a way they can receive?”

Those two questions could transform a church.

Honestly, they could transform a life.

Mental health affects everyone.

We are all at sea.

And because we are all at sea, we need each other.

We need the person who notices when we drift.

And the person who says, “I haven’t seen you in a while.”

We need the person who can sit in silence without rushing to decorate it

And the person who knows when it’s time to call for backup.

Church, the disciples don’t know what’s coming next.

They have a promise and they have each other.

And they have the courage to go to the upper room and wait together.

May we be a church where no one pretends they are on dry land.

May we be a church that learns to sail together.

May we be a church that risks delight together.

Not because the world is painless, but because it is precious.

Church, may we be a fleet that sails together with stubborn gladness.

Amen.