Numbed

Numbed

 

Matthew 11:16-19, 25-30

The yoke of discipleship 

 

11:16 "But to what will I compare this generation? It is like children sitting in the marketplaces and calling to one another,

 

11:17 'We played the flute for you, and you did not dance; we wailed, and you did not mourn.'

 

11:18 "For John came neither eating nor drinking, and they say, 'He has a demon';

 

11:19 the Son of Man came eating and drinking, and they say, 'Look, a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners!' Yet wisdom is vindicated by her deeds."

 

11:25 At that time Jesus said, "I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and the intelligent and have revealed them to infants;

 

11:26 yes, Father, for such was your gracious will.

 

11:27 All things have been handed over to me by my Father, and no one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and anyone to whom the Son chooses to reveal him.

 

11:28 "Come to me, all you who are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest.

 

11:29 Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.

 

11:30 For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light."

 

 

'We played the flute for you, and you did not dance; we wailed, and you did not mourn,' is one of my favorite passages of the whole Bible. I’m guessing it was part of a kiddie game, or something, in Jesus’ day? Doesn’t matter. The audience is clearly NUMB to both warnings and invitations. If this was written for any generation, it would certainly apply to the current one.

 

My daughter (and now granddaughter) plays the flute. It’s a beautiful instrument that doesn’t honk or squeak, when a tone is successfully produced by the flutist. When our daughter, Shelah, first decided to try the flute, as a student at Ben Fairless Elementary School in Braddock, PA (yes, THAT Braddock, that gave rise to PA Senator John Fetterman), we signed her up for the school instrument program, and retrieved a shiny, Yamaha flute for her to learn on. Now, I did the same thing many moons ago, but with a trumpet, and I’m guessing I drove my parents crazy during the early, “honking” phase. I did eventually learn to play it pretty well, rising to first chair in our high school band. Brass instruments honk, when first played, even as clarinets and saxophones squeak, either of which grinds at the nerves of unsuspecting ears like a diamond-based, industrial abrasive can grind down steel like it is made of cheddar cheese. The flute, though, either makes NO noise, when first played, or tends to offer an early “free sample” of the inherent “tone” the flutist might carry through her or his flute “career.” I’ll never forget that first day, when after her very first lesson, our little Shelah took out her flute to play it at home. She was in living room of our Turtle Creek parsonage, and my wife and I were in the kitchen. She had figured out how to make her flute play “Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star,” and that is what she played, while we eavesdropped from the adjoining room. What I heard loudly and clearly was a deep, rich, “woody” tone—the kind any flutist would covet. I said to Dara, “Oh, my! She’s got a GREAT tone!” (a brilliant observation, I know, but then I’m certainly no Leonard Bernstein). I walked into the living room where our precious little girl was proudly holding her flute. I asked her a couple of introductory questions about what she had “learned” during her first school flute lesson that day—especially how she had “figured out” Twinkle, Twinkle--and then I said something like this: “Shelah, we were listening as you played a few minutes ago. Even as a beginner, you have such BEAUTIFUL tone on this instrument. We would like to encourage you to work at it, stay with it, and perfect your ability with it, for you may have a wonderful gift.” She responded, “I WILL, Daddy!” 

 

And she did. Not only did she go on, years later, to have a flute performance minor in college (she majored in literature, which was always her first love), but she has played in churches, in the Tallahassee Winds (when she and her husband lived there), and has been a part of the incredible Christmas orchestra at Christ Church, United Methodist, in Louisville, KY. Her tone has only improved, and we have been oh so proud of her, in this. We both love to hear her play.

 

So, when I read, “We played the flute for you and you did not dance…” it invokes much sadness in me. I just can’t imagine anyone—anyone—listening to flute music and not wanting to dance, or to at least revel in the music and keep time with a tapping foot. In this expression coined by Jesus, the flute represents all that is worth celebrating and resonating rejoicingly in life. Only the most numb of folk would miss the joyous prompt. Still, all around us, I see and hear people who only know how to bitch and not praise, deprecate rather than appreciate, and reject rather than embrace. Through the best of the human expression, God is trying tirelessly to play “flute music” for us, in an effort to get us to dance a little. WAY too many sit silently, numbly, as the music plays, acting like they are tone deaf, while there are others who complain about it being “too loud.” It is my conviction that God wants less “praise” aimed at Godself, and more praise-worthy response to the music all around us. Me thinks the animal kingdom does a better job of hearing and jiving to the music than the “smartest” of us human creatures. How very sad. We even have a terribly negative phrase applied to calling someone to accountability: “Face the music.” Music should never be used as a vehicle for judgment or retribution. Music is a unique gift offered by our Creator that lights up a totally different part of the brain. Don’t denigrate it—CELEBRATE it! Jesus is imploring us to do so.

 

Then, the second half of the lyric says, “we wailed, and you did not mourn.” Life also brings things our way that should be heeded and mourned. The obvious ones are the deaths of loved ones or friends, or the loss of necessary, sustaining employment. Note something important here: we all fail, from time to time. These “failures” are NOT what Jesus is talking about here. Failure is a passage to improvement and “new beginnings,” as countless “heroes” have demonstrated. When we fail at something, and then regroup and begin again, we grow, and when the resulting success happens, we should hear the flute playing, and do a little dance. No, wailing and mourning are about the things in life that happen that we will never see again. People, for sure, but also things like the “eras” of our lives. Even when a divorce is a necessary step in a couples’ life, the proper response should be mourning. To not mourn is to be numb to the moments of shared richness that pretty much every relationship offers (exempting ones that may have degenerated into abuse). Even in marriages that go sadly sour, there were ecstatic, uplifting, and most likely exultant moments that should never be forgotten, and that will never come again. These should be mourned. 

 

Another of my “never forgets” happened when we took our “little girl” off to college. For two solid weeks after we got her situated with a remarkable roommate, I would go up to her room, sit on her now vacant bed, and just simply cry. I can never forget these important moments of mourning. I was obviously thrilled that she was now an honors student at a fine school, and situated with a wonderful roommate who would become a life-long friend (and Maid of Honor at her wedding, years later). But an “era” had passed that would never come again. No more story time before an evening prayer at bedside, no more precious little voice saying, “Goodnight, Daddy,” and no more calls from school asking me to bring her the Social Studies book she left behind while hastily exiting our home that morning. Believe me, neither was it easy to duplicate this experience when we dropped our son off at college, but at least he had chosen the SAME school as did our daughter, so parents’ weekends could be a bit of a “twofer,” but there really is nothing like that first one who “leaves the nest.” The important mourning moments of life do not have to be over “bad” experiences like a death or an unexpected diagnosis. We are numb if we have been rendered incapable of experiencing the mourning moments of stuff that has permanently changed, or an era that has passed. When we have grown numb to these moments, how will we ever find the compassion necessary to mourn alongside the larger human community—or church—when some calamity strikes?

 

The “preacher” in Ecclesiastes had it right: 

 

There is a time for everything,
    and a season for every activity under the heavens:

²     a time to be born and a time to die,
    a time to plant and a time to uproot,
³     a time to kill and a time to heal,
    a time to tear down and a time to build,
⁴     a time to weep and a time to laugh,
    a time to mourn and a time to dance,
⁵     a time to scatter stones and a time to gather them,
    a time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing,
⁶     a time to search and a time to give up,
    a time to keep and a time to throw away,
⁷     a time to tear and a time to mend,
    a time to be silent and a time to speak,
⁸     a time to love and a time to hate,
    a time for war and a time for peace.

 

When we become numb to these “seasons” of life, we render ourselves incapable of things like empathy, compassion, or even companionship. The numbness is truly numbing! AND it is debilitating. Even the animals get this, and we are so the lesser when we become so desensitized. 

 

Jesus ends this discourse with the promise: “My yoke is easy and my burden is light.” He’s saying that God doesn’t expect much of us, really, but to “act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God.” And to dance and mourn like we are human beings, when the music plays, or the wailing begins. Being numb to these prompts is truly a “deadening” thing. Don’t die, LIVE, Beloved! Drink in the best of what life offers, even when it is a “passage” that may bring you to tears, for a time. Some like to say “Life is too short to…” (you complete the phrase). Jesus is telling us that life is just too precious to be numb to all of the experiences it offers as its greatest gift to our humanity. Don’t you think there is a REASON that God sent God’s “only begotten Son” into the world as a human being? First, to experience that which is uniquely human, and THEN to light our pathways so we wouldn’t miss the dancing and the mourning along our way. Pay attention, Beloved. The best is ALWAYS yet to come! Amen.

Staying with the Donkey

 

Staying with the Donkey

 

Genesis 22:1-14

The testing of Abraham 

 

22:1 After these things God tested Abraham. He said to him, "Abraham!" And he said, "Here I am."

 

22:2 He said, "Take your son, your only son Isaac, whom you love, and go to the land of Moriah and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains that I shall show you."

 

22:3 So Abraham rose early in the morning, saddled his donkey, and took two of his young men with him and his son Isaac; he cut the wood for the burnt offering and set out and went to the place in the distance that God had shown him.

 

22:4 On the third day Abraham looked up and saw the place far away.

 

22:5 Then Abraham said to his young men, "Stay here with the donkey; the boy and I will go over there; we will worship, and then we will come back to you."

 

22:6 Abraham took the wood of the burnt offering and laid it on his son Isaac, and he himself carried the fire and the knife. And the two of them walked on together.

 

22:7 Isaac said to his father Abraham, "Father!" And he said, "Here I am, my son." He said, "The fire and the wood are here, but where is the lamb for a burnt offering?"

 

22:8 Abraham said, "God himself will provide the lamb for a burnt offering, my son." And the two of them walked on together.

 

22:9 When they came to the place that God had shown him, Abraham built an altar there and laid the wood in order. He bound his son Isaac and laid him on the altar on top of the wood.

 

22:10 Then Abraham reached out his hand and took the knife to kill his son.

 

22:11 But the angel of the LORD called to him from heaven and said, "Abraham, Abraham!" And he said, "Here I am."

 

22:12 He said, "Do not lay your hand on the boy or do anything to him, for now I know that you fear God, since you have not withheld your son, your only son, from me."

 

22:13 And Abraham looked up and saw a ram, caught in a thicket by its horns. Abraham went and took the ram and offered it up as a burnt offering instead of his son.

 

22:14 So Abraham called that place "The LORD will provide," as it is said to this day, "On the mount of the LORD it shall be provided."

 

This week’s lectionary passages are full of possibility. This text from Genesis is the famous one where Abraham takes his “only” son, Isaac, to the mountains to “obey” God and sacrifice him to God. One can only imagine what might have been going through Abraham’s head. There was, of course, a tremendous backstory. Abraham and Sarah believed God’s promise that they would be the progenitors of a great nation dedicated to Yahweh—Israel. But they were advancing in age, and nothing was happening with the human “baby factory” within their bodies. Sarah gets the idea to have the old boy sleep with her young handmaiden, Hagar, and then they could claim the resulting child as their own. Thus, Ishmael was brought into the world. This story is a kind of parable, explaining how two “competing” factions for human and divine acceptance, and power, of course. The Arab and Jewish realms are thus charted in biblical history. Of course, God does eventually deliver on God’s promise to give two very old people a child of their own—Isaac. Perhaps the quirky history of Israel, including blessings, pograms, a rich heritage, blended with a latter penchant for military dominance, is due to the aged engrams of Isaac’s aged parentage, and whatever biological and psychological factors they introduced? But that is not what this sermon is about.

 

As usual, in my retirement, without a specific congregation to focus on, different kinds of things have been catching my attention when I peruse the New Common Lectionary of weekly readings from the Bible. I should not be surprised that texts from the Hebrew Bible have been more interesting to me than those of the New Testament, which became such fodder for church ecclesiology and doctrine! The Hebrew Bible is much more about the “wrestling match” between us humans and the Divine, and its history, stories, prophecy, and wisdom touch more profoundly on the machinations of the human condition, the mind, and the ethereal “soul.” The tension of the Abraham/Isaac/God “sacrificial” triangle is one such story, provoking the reader to deal with her/his own “feelings” of what it might have been like to choose between child and obedience to the Divine. Preachers down through the centuries have surely soothed their congregations with some historical or psychological rationalization over God’s telling Abraham to sacrifice his only “official” son, while turning his back on the tainted “son of manipulation,” Ishmael. All this aside, what caught my attention in this passage is found in verse 5: "Stay here with the donkey; the boy and I will go over there; we will worship…”

 

The “young men” who accompanied Abraham and Isaac on this journey were told to “stay here with the donkey…” They were to be left out of history (or kept from being witnesses to a murder?) in order to babysit a jackass. (I could say something political about this scenario, but will refrain. Be glad.) From this moment on, church history is filled with people obediently “babysitting jackasses.” Let’s view that as a metaphor for the important, but largely thankless jobs that kept religious history moving forward. Just imagine how many minor, MINOR prophets there were in Hebrew history who also spoke God’s “word” to single tribes, or possibly even smaller audiences, whose subsequent obedience led to a victory, be in moral, or in the field of battle. Who were they? I have always found it fascinating that Paul, in his long greetings or closing “gratitudes,” gave us the names of many such “donkey watchers” in Christian history. For every John Calvin or John Wesley, there were countless “Alices,” “Sallys,” “Roberts,” and “Bens” who carried out the work in the trenches. When the proverbial “gates of hell” fail to prevail over the church, thus thrusting it into its next challenge, you can believe there was a cast of “donkey watchers” out there who “won the battle” over the devil. In Charles W. Ferguson’s volume, Organizing to Beat the Devil, he details the multi-level, organizing steps taken by John Wesley and the early “Methodists” to advance the cause of the Gospel—“beat the devil” at his own game, so to speak. Methodism has thrived—when it has—because of the “donkey watchers,” whose names may only be known on a task list or a Charge Conference report. Without them, though, the devil would have won “bigly,” by now.

 

In previous sermons, I have cited people like Clint, Julie, Jim, Rick, Ed, Peggy, Bonnie, John, Faith, Mary, Michael, or so many others whom YOU have never heard of, but will forever be on their pastor’s “hall of fame” list. They were not only the “donkey watchers,” but the ones who fed the beasts, groomed them, picked up after them, and let others know when they needed a break from their labors. While we pastors may be best compared to those “minor, MINOR prophets” who spoke God’s “word” to smaller, sometimes disinterested audiences, these lay folk had just as strong a call to “watch the donkeys” and take care of the stuff that nurtured the church, its mission, and its people. Donkey watchers hardly aim for recognition or glory; in fact, the most effective of them like to remain as anonymous as possible. Note: these are NOT the people who keep making excuses that they “aren’t gifted” or “can’t do anything”; I’ll just call them the “just haven’t yet yielded to God’s call” crowd. No, “donkey watchers” are in the game, enthusiastically, and while they may shun the proverbial “limelight,” they WILL and DO step up, when the work calls for it. One of the most gratifying surprises we pastors have had is when one of the “donkey watchers” is asked to say a few words of recruitment or invitation from the pulpit, and do so eloquently and quite effectively, and without needing an egg timer to limit their verbiage. If the church has its “meat and potatoes,” these people fill the bill.

 

I’ve most likely preached 25 sermons in my career on the Abraham-sacrificing-Isaac story, and I still don’t get it, honestly. Oh SURE it’s a simple metaphor for a horrible act God actually went through with in Jesus, but something doesn’t feel right about that comparison? Then there’s the “God already knew God would “provide the lamb in the thicket,” and was just testing Abraham, motif. Again, this seems like a copout to me, too. So, where did I wind up on this seminal story from the Hebrew Bible? How about this: Abraham was caught between his love for God and his FEAR of God. A loving God would never ask a man to sacrifice his beloved son, but a powerful God might “have a reason” to do so, and not obeying could have escalating ramifications for the people Abraham represented. How often have YOU been caught between fear and love? Don’t tell me you don’t understand, for if you never have, you haven’t engaged in any serious relationships, either with human beings or deity. Like so many jarring stories from the Old Testament, it matters not whether this event actually happened, for the predicament it puts the reader in the middle of has nothing to do with the historicity of it. The Jonah story doesn’t need a scientific “explanation” as to whether a man could survive a three-day ride in a fish gullet to make its point, and neither does it matter one iota whether Job was a real person, and HIS predicament an historically accurate event to give us one of the most powerful lessons of the whole Bible. The “donkey watchers” of the church know this; you won’t find them arguing a Bible passage over the question “Is it a true story?” The truth is in the telling, even as the “truth” of their Christian commitment is in the serving. 

 

Two interesting things have happened to me, since I retired from full-time service in the preaching pulpit: I find myself more mystified by the Old Testament and its wealth of “good material” to study and explore; and I ruminate almost daily about some of the people in the six churches I served who gave of themselves quite unselfishly for the welfare of the church, and in service to the Gospel of Jesus Christ—you know, the “donkey watchers.” In the latter case, in carrying the “donkey watching” metaphor to its logical end, I also found myself wondering who the jackass stood for, and my conclusion was not at all flattering, I’ll tell you. If you are a pastor reading this, you know where I’m going with it.

 

I’ll leave you with this thought: the most valuable people in the history of Judeo-Christianity are ones you have never heard of. They are ones who labor behind the scenes. They are, however, persons who, when called upon to “step up” or to ascend the pulpit steps, have a deeply inspirational (effective?) story to tell. They may be “elevating” or “edifying” more than eloquent, and “available” more than “able,” regarding some tasks, but they WILL and DO show up. Time and time, again. And there is no “donkey” they won’t watch, allowing the bigger story to unfold. Thanks be to God for the ones who “stay with the donkey”! Amen.

Mocking Birds

 

Mocking Birds

 

Jeremiah 20:7-13

The prophet must speak 

 

20:7 O LORD, you have enticed me, and I was enticed; you have overpowered me, and you have prevailed. I have become a laughingstock all day long; everyone mocks me.

 

20:8 For whenever I speak, I must cry out; I must shout, "Violence and destruction!" For the word of the LORD has become for me a reproach and derision all day long.

 

20:9 If I say, "I will not mention him or speak any more in his name," then within me there is something like a burning fire shut up in my bones; I am weary with holding it in, and I cannot.

 

20:10 For I hear many whispering: "Terror is all around! Denounce him! Let us denounce him!" All my close friends are watching for me to stumble. "Perhaps he can be enticed, and we can prevail against him and take our revenge on him."

 

20:11 But the LORD is with me like a terrifying warrior; therefore my persecutors will stumble, and they will not prevail. They will be greatly shamed, for they will not succeed. Their eternal dishonor will never be forgotten.

 

20:12 O LORD of hosts, you test the righteous; you see the heart and the mind; let me see your retribution upon them, for to you I have committed my cause.

 

20:13 Sing to the LORD; praise the LORD! For he has delivered the life of the needy from the hands of evildoers

 

This text begins with two very interesting words: “enticed,” and “mocks.” Both of them are poignant illustrations of how differently words can be perceived. When I think of “enticed,” I am tempted to think of “tempted.” (Sorry, didn’t mean to do that…) The dictionary says something like “entice” means to offer something desirable to someone in an attempt to get them to do something. Sounds like the proverbial “carrot on a stick” thing to me. First of all, the entice-ee must like carrots, or the jig is up for the enticer. So, the choice of “bait” used must be appropriate to the intended audience. As they say, don’t holler “sermon” in a crowded casino or a busy bar, as you’ll be quite disappointed at the response, if not outright injured. In a negative context, the enticer is looking to benefit his/her self by getting some unsuspecting actor to DO something that they might not otherwise do on their own, and to the benefit of the one doing the enticing. As we read in 4^th grade, Tom Sawyer masterfully entices his neighborhood friends to whitewash the fence in the eponymous Mark Twain novel by using reverse psychology. Politicians entice citizens to vote for them by offering outlandish promises, such as the town council candidate who says he will control immigration or the schoolboard candidate who says she will curtail abortions, if elected. Such promises, while initially casting aspersions on the political candidates themselves, truthfully indict the voters, for these kinds of candidates DO get elected, as we have witnessed, so some hoodwinked or mentally questionable majority had to exercise their legal right, albeit foolishly. 

 

“Entice” can have a benevolent meaning, however, as we see here in this text from Jeremiah. The prophet writes that it was God who did the enticing, in this case, to speak God’s word to an audience that is, at best, unprepared to hear it, and at worst, is hostile to it (remember “sermon” in a crowded casino?). When God does the enticing, God promises to have the backs of the entice-ees, and as this text shows, generally does. Of course, this thought takes me to another of my favorite movies (as the Bible often does)—“Oh, God,” the original, staring George Burns as God and John Denver (yes, THAT John Denver) as Jerry Landers, the supermarket manager and reluctant “prophet” God enlists to “give his word” to the world. In this entertaining story, God is much higher on the “calling” scale, and not quite so much on the “having his back” on the defensive side, at least until late in the film. In the Bible, I’m guessing most of the prophets would identify with Jerry Landers, at least until “the word” turns out to be “the truth,” even to the often hostile audience. Remember Elijah, hiding in the cave, paranoid about his future after defeating the prophets of Baal? Still, God ultimately does defend God’s spokespersons, unless you count John the Baptist, Jesus, and Paul, all of whom met an untimely end, after challenging authority. George Burns’ portrayal of the Almighty in the movie caught God’s occasional reticence in standing up for God’s human “mouthpieces.” God may have a higher aim in mind, and martyrdom may be on the docket, if for nothing else, to prove a point to the human community that God’s ways are decidedly NOT our ways. In short, God’s enticements to the would be prophets are with the intended audience in mind, not the messenger, who may “get shot” in the line of duty. Part of faith is believing that all things will come out in the “great wash” at the end of the line.

 

The other word in verse one of this text is “mocks.” Now, here’s another verb that can have differing “nuances,” depending on what the “mocker” has in mind. I have usually viewed being “mocked” as a negative. “Don’t MOCK me!” is not a statement made by someone who is feeling flattered by the act. To repeat someone’s statement in a snide way is most often labeled as “mocking,” but to repeat it as a point of recall or emphasis, may be viewed as a high compliment. Given what Jeremiah is saying here, he wasn’t hearing the “word of the Lord” that he was proclaiming coming back at him for clarification or to endorse the message. There’s this: For the word of the LORD has become for me a reproach and derision all day long. As Jerry Landers found out, even a “good word” turns sour in some peoples’ minds when it is given as “from God.” The problem is, if it really IS from God, it’s hard to argue with, unless you’re Moses. And many folk have a hard time with that kind of finality or “last word” on anything. Since Jeremiah is writing somewhere around 600 B.C.E., I’m guessing we can say this kind of “derision” is universal among humans. Jeremiah’s mocking was not praise for his eloquent rhetoric; not praise at all.

 

There’s another word that catches my self-diagnosed ADHD brain: “derision.” John Wesley and his fellow Oxford students that had banded together to study the Bible, nurture their mutual spirituality, and perform acts of mercy to the less fortunate of England back in the early 18^th century, were branded “Methodists” by other, far less pietist students. It was a term of derision—or “mocking,” as some might say. Of course, it stuck, and here we are today as “United Methodists.” United? Well, those of us who stayed are working at it, but the former United Methodists who chose to disaffiliate, not so much. Are we still “methodical” in our approach to social issues, spiritual formation, and prayer? I might suggest that the centuries of embellished polity, systemic, hierarchal posturing and politicking, and “spreading thin” of way too many good goals have eroded our “method” into a kind of mish-mash of great expectations and good intentions. We HAVE done many good works to the glory of God, and we HAVE helped many people with their human needs and fostered much discipleship, but some would say we created an overly bureaucratic structure that is not “taming well” after the loss of almost half of our denomination. Am I mocking this predicament? Perhaps. But I digress…

 

The Northern Mocking Bird is an interesting creature. It is able to duplicate the calls of neighboring birds, and even the human-made, mechanical sounds of society, I am told. I have an Audubon app on my phone that picks up a bird call and can tell me what specific bird produced it. From time to time, it will hear a call that I KNOW is of a Cardinal or a Chickadee, of some sort, but the app says it’s a Northern Mocking Bird, obviously displaying a keen, technical ability to discriminate “real” from “Memorex,” as the old recording tape used to say. Amazing. I looked up the Northern Mocking Bird, and all of the science on the little beast says that it does not “mock” the calls of other birds for any nefarious reason. It is not a predator, it is not trying to steal their mates, or anything like that. It just does this because it can, and possibly to entertain itself. Of course, it, too, is looking for a mate, and being skilled at mocking other birds’ calls may also demonstrate its abilities for a female of its species, who would otherwise be unimpressed with its dull, gray appearance. I guess some are show-ers, while others are, well, mockers. 

 

Humans who mock others may be showing off, too, but mostly lesser skills and possibly even displaying an inferiority complex. To paraphrase an old line, Those who can, DO, while those who can’t, make fun of those who DO. Human mocking birds are not attracting females in spades, either, and the few who may be “attracted” by the male mocker are sparing another, more gifted male a miserable existence. The prophets of God like Jeremiah—or Jerry Flanders, for that matter—may not like the mocking they endure, and may pray that God give them their comeuppance, but in the end, those with the REAL “good words” prevail with truth as their shield and buckler. The “mocking birds” who attack the messenger and eschew heeding their message wind up with egg on their beaks.

 

We live in a day when those “mocking birds” among us deride truth, embrace empty boasts and broken promises, and proclaim themselves superior to the immigrant and the downtrodden. Perhaps this makes them feel superior, in some way, but in God’s eyes, they are hanging a millstone around their own necks, which will silence their stolen song, in the long run. The prophets among us who speak the truth, even in the face of the mockers and the oppressors, will have the final say, but it won’t puff their egos, for they know that ultimate truths belong not to them, but to the Divine. Jesus wound up on a cross for telling the truth and calling out the “mocking birds” of his generation as “whitewashed graves.” All of the remaining twelve disciples died as martyrs, history tells us, for they dared using their words and deeds to keep the truth of Jesus alive (might this be the “second resurrection” Jesus spoke of?). Paul lost his head because he refused to stay silent about the inbreaking Kingdom of God. And down through the ages, countless “mocking birds” have taken the sword, the flame, and the lynching tree up against those who speak and live God’s rightful truth. They, too, will have their feathers ruffled at the judgment seat. To quote Jeremiah: They will be greatly shamed, for they will not succeed. Their eternal dishonor will never be forgotten. May we be “birds of a different feather,” Dear Ones, and may our song be that of the Mourning Dove that pines for peace and justice. Amen.

 

The Insecurity of Covenants

The Insecurity of Covenants

 

Exodus 19:2-8a

The covenant with Israel at Sinai 

 

19:2 They journeyed from Rephidim, entered the wilderness of Sinai, and camped in the wilderness; Israel camped there in front of the mountain.

 

19:3 Then Moses went up to God; the LORD called to him from the mountain, "Thus you shall say to the house of Jacob and tell the Israelites:

 

19:4 'You have seen what I did to the Egyptians and how I bore you on eagles' wings and brought you to myself.

 

19:5 Now, therefore, if you obey my voice and keep my covenant, you shall be my treasured possession out of all the peoples. Indeed, the whole earth is mine,

 

19:6 but you shall be for me a priestly kingdom and a holy nation. 'These are the words that you shall speak to the Israelites."

 

19:7 So Moses went, summoned the elders of the people, and set before them all these words that the LORD had commanded him.

 

19:8a The people all answered as one, "Everything that the LORD has spoken we will do."

 

The thing about covenants is that they are great…until they aren’t. Think about it. Marriage covenants are broken all the time, whether it is by alienation of affection and infidelity, or just reneging on all the promises we make when we “solemnize” them. I promised to “love, honor, and cherish” my partner, but that reminds me of the old Stephen Wright joke: A guy goes to a store advertising “Open 24 Hours,” and finds the door locked; he bangs on the door until the owner comes out, and he says, “I thought this store was open 24 hours,” to which the owner answers, “Well, not in a ROW!” “Love, honor, and cherish”…but not all at ONCE! Thankfully our 49-plus marriage covenant has not had to weather any storms beyond my occasional breaching of one of these “Honey, I love you” elements. True confessions? It’s usually the “cherish” one, when we are arguing. 

 

There are all kinds of covenants: some are like legal contracts; others are more akin to “handshake agreements.” All of them are some kind of “promise” to either do or DON’T do something. One of the things that may derail a covenant happens when both covenanting parties have divergent views of what the covenant means. Go back to our marriage covenant: when one partner thinks it just means not openly dating another person, while the other takes seriously the whole “love, honor, and cherish” part, bad things happen. Two parties can MAKE a covenant, but if there are varying understandings about how the covenant is kept, even a well-constructed covenant isn’t worth the paper (or “handshake”) it’s printed on. Of course, this reminds me of another joke from Seinfeld: Jerry makes a rental car reservation (a covenant, as he sees it), but when his flight lands, the rental desk has no cars available. He argues with the reservation clerk regarding just what a “reservation” means. He “explains” that a reservation should mean that they will hold a car for him. The indignant clerk protests by saying she knows what a “reservation” is, to which Jerry responds, “I don’t think you do! You know how to “take” the reservation, you just don’t know how to “keep” the reservation!” This goes to our understanding of covenants, doesn’t it? We know how to MAKE the covenant, we may just not agree on how to KEEP the covenant. One only needs to read the Old Testament to see that God and Israel had this problem much of the time.

 

Pastors spend much time “sermonizing” about covenants: reminding members of the “membership vows” (covenant) they took when they joined the church; of the baptismal vows they took (covenant) to raise their children in the life of the church; or of their “commitment to Jesus Christ” (covenant) they made, urging them to be faithful to it. Hopefully we preachers of grace ALSO remind them that in Christ, God made a covenant with humanity that will never be breached. If a “disconnect” occurs, guess who is at fault? This gets at the heart of my own practice of covenant-keeping, by the way. I FIRST assume that if there is a problem with a particular covenant, I am the one at fault. If I start there, it keeps me from immediately blaming the other party. You’d be amazed how many times it never gets beyond that, as I AM usually the party that is having a “promise problem.”

 

In their title song from David Merrick’s musical of the same name, Burt Bacharach and Hal David wrote:

 

Oh, promises
Those kind of promises
Take all the joy from life

Oh, promises, promises

My kind of promises
Can lead to joy
And hope and love
Yes, love!

 

These lyrics illustrate the sometimes fickle nature of the covenants and promises we make. Some covenants lead to freedom, while others are designed to create boundaries or restrict. Human beings need both to have happiness and security. But when we bump up against covenantal walls when we’re looking for freedom, we get upset, and when we feel “too free” while needing a fence to rein in our inappropriate wanderlust, it is just as disconcerting. All this well summarizes my opening statement: covenants are great…until they’re not.

 

Covenants that are too constraining are most inconvenient, and while designed to give us boundaries, they may actually make us feel even more insecure. It’s kind of like the Dutch reclaiming land from the sea using dikes. Having the land is nice, but the more the sea strains against our “covenantal” dikes, there is always the chance that one of them will let loose. Now THAT’S an insecurity! Dara and I just signed a binding covenant with a retirement community where we will be moving to next month. And while this has been our plan for some time, and while this is a wonderful retirement community that has fantastic independent living options like the one we’ve taken, there is both a “finality” and a fear about permanently aligning ourselves with both a set of agreed upon rules and standards, and committing so much of our retirement resources to it. You know what is performing a “healing” on my initial apprehensions about this major “covenantal” leap? Beginning to sort and pack our “stuff” to both prepare for the move, and to “stage” our home for sale, as directed by our realtor! Fatiguing myself beyond reason in the process is fully convincing me we made a wise choice. Had we stayed where we are, none of this “weeding out” would have occurred, and our two adult children would have been left with a mess, when we “shuffle off this mortal coil.” At least in the retirement community, they know how to guide survivors as to how to deal with the remaining stupid “stuff” accumulated, may even have others in the community who would like to pick through it like scavengers.

 

Today’s text is about the Sinai Covenant between God and Israel, as brokered by Moses. God, after reminding Israel of all God had already done for them by liberating them from slavery in Egypt, promises to care for them and hold them as a “treasured possession” before all other peoples, if Israel promises to keep the covenant and obey God’s voice. In short: “If you will be my people, I will be your God.” Sounds simple; sounds like a good idea, having such a close relationship with the God of the universe, especially when their “blessings” look so tempting to other “peoples” surrounding them. Here’s the thing that caught my preacher’s eye, though—the last verse of the pericope: “The people all answered as one, ‘Everything that the LORD has spoken we will do.’” Knowing human beings, THAT sounds too good to be true. Everything that the LORD has spoken? They will “do” it? It sounds like the teenage boy whose father is gifting him a car. The father says, “I’ll give you this car on the condition that you keep it in good condition, pay for the necessary auto insurance, and drive it safely and obey the traffic laws,” to which the teen hurriedly answers, “Yeah, yeah, I will! GIVE ME the keys!” You know where that one is headed. In this text, God is giving Israel the keys. Oh, and we Christians should remember the parable Jesus told about the father and two sons (no, the OTHER father and two sons), one of whom said he would go work in the vineyard and the other, who said he wouldn’t. The one who “covenanted” to go, didn’t show up, but the one who didn’t commit, DID show up. Jesus praised the latter. Covenants may sound good on paper, but if there is no actual action proposed by them, what are they?

 

I don’t want to get overly negative here. Dara and I were blessed with two wonderful and generally compliant children. We really trusted them, and they rarely gave us any reason to NOT trust them. When they said they would do something, they did it (at least to the best of our knowledge). Similarly, Israel DID often obey God and keep the various covenants they had with the Divine. When they did things went well with them. When they didn’t, the old “What you sow, you will also reap” thing applied. (With Israel’s herky-jerky track record, it’s no wonder that Jesus brought this little chestnut back into prominence through his teachings and parables.) Our experience with our two children reminds us that people CAN keep covenants, and occasionally DO what they say they will DO. However, too anxiously saying “Yeah, yeah, give me the keys” and driving off can sow seeds of impending doom, when it comes to covenants. 

 

Ultimately, it comes down to the integrity of those making the covenant in the first place. Then, have the two (or more) parties also hammered out at least a boilerplate shared agreement on what it means to KEEP the promises of the covenant in question? And what about accountability? Are there “penalties” for breaking the covenant, or is it truly just a “What you sow you will reap” system? In the case of God’s covenant with Israel—and with humanity through the Christ Event—the integrity of God is not really in question. Oh, there were those times when Moses had to argue with God and “remind” God of God’s culpability in creating humans with “free will,” n’at, but still, God is not one to be trifled with in covenantal matters. Humans, on the other hand, can have our issues with them. God can go out of God’s way to offer all kinds of blessings and rewards, but when God asks simply that Israel be a “royal priesthood” and be respectful of the Divine, Israel be like, “Oh, do we really have to have the car back by MIDNIGHT?” 

 

And finally, going full circle, we would be well to be reminded that covenants—if only made to offer security of the “lesser” party—may breed INSECURITY more than safety. The best covenants are between two respectful, faithful, and “loving” parties—more like a marriage than a legal contract. When covenants spell out positive actions, describe and “codify” a respectful relationship, and create an environment of mutuality, not dominance. Some naysayers of the Christ Event have suggested that God could have “fixed” the human sin problem by snapping God’s fingers instead of making the kind of sojourn among us that Jesus advanced. But not if you understand what I just said about the nature of a true covenant. Jesus came to “be” with humanity, to fully understand us, our temptations, our fears, and our need for healing at multiple levels. It didn’t matter that these may be “consequences” of our own choices. The fact is, we were separated and suffering, and this is not the life God created us to have. Jesus himself said it: “I came that you might have life, and life abundantly.” In this covenant, there is NO insecurity! Amen.

 

What Makes a Nation Great?

What Makes a Great Nation?

 

Genesis 12:1-9

Journey in the promise 

 

12:1 Now the Lord said to Abram, "Go from your country and your kindred and your father's house to the land that I will show you.

 

12:2 I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing.

 

12:3 I will bless those who bless you, and the one who curses you I will curse, and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed."

 

12:4 So Abram went, as the Lord had told him, and Lot went with him. Abram was seventy-five years old when he departed from Haran.

 

12:5 Abram took his wife Sarai and his brother's son Lot and all the possessions that they had gathered and the persons whom they had acquired in Haran, and they set forth to go to the land of Canaan. When they had come to the land of Canaan,

 

12:6 Abram passed through the land to the place at Shechem, to the oak of Moreh. At that time the Canaanites were in the land.

 

12:7 Then the Lord appeared to Abram and said, "To your offspring I will give this land." So he built there an altar to the Lord, who had appeared to him.

 

12:8 From there he moved on to the hill country on the east of Bethel and pitched his tent, with Bethel on the west and Ai on the east, and there he built an altar to the Lord and invoked the name of the Lord.

 

12:9 And Abram journeyed on by stages toward the Negeb.

 

Did you ever start out a sermon with an unrelated excursus? I’m sure I was told in seminary that this was anathema, but the last verse of this pericope of scripture caught my attention as I began to explore the text. “And Abram journeyed on by stages toward the Negeb.” That “journeyed on by stages” is what is causing the detour on my OWN sermon-writing journey, presently. You see, I’m a “journey theology” kind of person. There are those who revel in doctrines and dogmas, in terms of their faith, while others swing from worship service to worship service like Spiderman on silk. Then there are those for whom their “incubator” of spiritual formation is prayer and meditation. I’m a journey guy. When John Wesley said that Christ followers should “go on to perfection,” it sounded like a direction to me, so I’ve set my spiritual GPS on “perfection,” and expect life will give me the proper prompts as to when to turn and what roads to take. That has worked well for almost 72 years now. Some would say I’m relying too much on the grace of God, doing it this way, but I fail to see how that is a bad thing? A big part of my “trip” has been academics—degrees, classes, reading, and writing. (Hence, in retirement, I write a weekly sermon, and if you’re reading this on my blog, you’ve stumbled onto my path, dear friend!)

 

If we’re being honest, I think we ALL are on a spiritual journey, if we are Christ followers. As I said in another recent sermon, we follow a peripatetic Savior, and regardless of which spiritually formative practices trip our personal trigger, we ARE going somewhere. And when we’re not? Look at the phrases we use: “I’m feeling stuck,” “I’m stagnant in my faith,” “I feel like my prayers are just hitting the ceiling,” “I’m feeling LOST.” These are all directional vectors, aren’t they? The text says that Abram is on HIS journey by taking it “in stages.” What this evokes in me is the idea that not all steps are equal, not each day’s travel is as far, and when it comes to delays or detours along the way, we can either rail against them as sidetracking us, or stop and check out the place where we are being detained, possibly meeting new friends along the way. This latter idea reminds me of the Camino de Santiago, which I also mentioned in a recent sermon. The “Camino,” as it is known, is a long, walking pilgrimage across parts of Europe that ends at the Cathedral of Santiago de Compostela in Spain. People register to “take the Camino,” and off they go. Several of my friends have done one, and if you want to get a flavor for this unique faith journey, rent the movie, “The Way,” starring Martin Sheen. People meet people and encounter all kinds of “unexpecteds” along the Camino, which sounds exactly like what Abram did on his journey to reach the Negeb. Isn’t “real life” like that? Or are you one of those personalities that just HAS to have a plan for everything, and are “out of your element” if something happens you hadn’t planned for? Maybe it’s time for you to move out of your comfort zone for a while as a “spiritual sacrifice”? For those of you, like me, who relish the “unexpecteds,” especially when they mean new people, new lessons, and new experiences, then ENJOY your “journey in stages” like it is your own personal “Camino”!

 

What I really wanted to address in this message, though, is the word from God that God wants to make from Abram “a great nation.” WHAT is a “great nation,” I wondered? Diehard literalists will probably tell me that “great” here means “large,” “numerous,” or “exceedingly wealthy and powerful.” These might be the hallmarks of a “great nation,” and I can see the truth here, at least from a political perspective. But what truly makes a nation great? If one takes the Torah seriously, one comes to the conclusion that what God, and God’s Jewish people, think is a great nation has little to do with just population, power, and geography. If you get caught up in the contemporary rhetoric about political Israel, Palestine, Gaza, and this Netanyahu/Trump stuff, you may fall into both the pit of despair and the “black hole” of a timeless war that threatens to consume us all, neither of which are welcome detours, frankly. Wrangling over “who is right” and “who is wrong” in this one gives new meaning to “pitstop,” for it is a pit that will stop everything, for there IS no right and wrong in it, other than that I hope we can agree that innocent people dying on either side is a bad idea.

 

No, the Torah postulates a great nation as one that “welcomes the stranger” in its midst, treating the sojourning foreigner like a fully-vested citizen, and providing radical hospitality for them! The Hebrew code of hospitality is one of the strongest commands God gave Israel, pretty much next in line behind loving God with all their heart, soul, strength, and mind. Netanyahu should read the Torah. Donald Trump should just read…something. And Christians who back “strong man” Israel against the residents of Gaza and the Arab world should read their Bibles. Great nations are ones made up of citizens who truly want to honor God and their fellow human siblings. Torah, Koran, and the canon of scripture of the Christian all describe “greatness” in terms of honoring God by LOVING God and LOVING neighbor, with the understanding that “neighbor” is anyone other than one’s immediate family, and often especially those with presenting needs.

 

Truly great nations would have little issue with the benevolent teachings of these holy books, and most especially with the teachings of Jesus Christ. One of the things I have always appreciated about John Wesley, the founder of Methodism, is that he wasn’t about just “saving souls” by leading them to a relationship to Jesus Christ. While he certainly did this, he also believed firmly in saving the PEOPLE involved, too, not just their “soul.” As much as he preached, he visited the sick and those in prisons, and not just to pray for them. He launched ministries aimed at feeding the poor, reforming the prisons, and providing access to education, of which he profoundly understood the value. England credited this holistic ministry of Mr. Wesley’s as one of the most effective “engines” (or at least catalysts) of the Industrial Revolution that cemented that country’s fortune and helped lead many of its people OUT of poverty, in that day. When I made my first trip to England, by the way, it was around the 250^thanniversary of John Wesley’s famous “Aldersgate experience,” which launched the Methodist movement. All over London the GOVERNMENT had hung banners with Mr. Wesley’s visage on them, celebrating alongside the Methodists, validating the importance of this historic movement in the successful history of England’s “great nation.” (As it turns out, though, nations have a hard time keeping their focus on the welfare of their poorest citizens, which is a tragedy we will NOT find celebrated in the Kingdom of God, either “here, there, or in the air,” as they say.)

 

Some “believers” today are saying that their rendition of a “great nation” is one that believes in Jesus Christ (but not necessarily his teachings about the poor, the oppressed, and the identity of “who is my neighbor,” as he relates in the parable of “The Good Samaritan”). They have bought the embellished history that was “rewritten” in the late revivalist period of the late 1800s and early 1900s, and famously “retold” in the 1970s in a book called “The Light and the Glory” by Peter Marshall, Jr., son of the famous Senate chaplain, Peter Marshall, Sr. Marshall and his co-author made “use” of this rewritten revivalist history to assert that American was founded as a “Christian” nation by people like Jefferson, Franklin, Washington, and Adams, who were devote Christians (they were not). As I have stated in previous sermons, the veritable “pen” of the American Revolution, Thomas Paine, was a confessed Deist who absolutely HATED Christianity and the “idea” that God would visit earth in human form. Paine wrote numerous treatises and pamphlets against the Christian faith. All of these historical facts didn’t stop Marshall from capitalizing on this false notion that America has a “Christian” foundation. All this said, this “evangelical” phenomenon has crafted a narrative that says that a “great nation” must be a Chrisitan one, oppose abortion, deify the Second Amendment, and support Israel at all costs. Obviously, there are numerous problems with this formulation. First of all, we were founded as a FREE nation, and these folk are ignoring the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment of the U.S. constitution. And the unwavering support of Israel is advocated because these folk believe the Bible says we must (it does not). While the Bible does talk of Christians loving “God’s people,” it does not address the modern political state of Israel, which is a construct of the United Nations in 1948. It bears little resemblance to Israel of the Bible, especially on the worst days of both! Besides, most of the evangelicals who believe this are doing so because they claim that supporting modern Israel will lead to events that will precipitate the “return of Christ,” something they think will benefit them. (Frankly, the way many of the them are behaving, I don’t think they should be so eager to be face-to-face with the actual Jesus of the Bible. Things might not work out the way they think they will.)

 

So, what IS a “great nation”? Well, I do believe it is one that is “god-fearing,” in that its principles make it easier for people to worship the god of their choice. It is a nation that TRULY CARES for the “least of these,” and offers all people equal rights and opportunities to prosper (something Jesus labeled “abundant life”). A great nation is not racist or sexist, and it respects and cares for its elder citizens. It makes sure that the gap between the “haves” and the “have nots” is always lessening, and the faster, the better. Great nations can have almost any kind of economic and governmental system, providing it supports and uplifts ALL of its people, with no political, religious, or economic group allowed to dominate all others. Great nations seek to edify and relate to all other countries of the world. “America First” is not the slogan of a truly great nation. And while we’re at it, can we take a good look at that MAGA slogan, “Make America Great Again”? When was that? Was it when our nation was drawn together over a World War, forgetting the trappings of “rich” and “poor,” largely, and rallying together to eliminate tyranny from the world? Was it after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, when again we were “closer” as a people, feeling like an attack on New York City, Shanksville, PA, and Washington, D.C. was a full-on attack on ALL of us? While these were overly “simplified” times of at least some form of national unity, it doesn’t seem like this is what the MAGA folk are meaning. It doesn’t take reading much between the proverbial lines to see that the “America” they want was a strong WHITE America. A nation when other ethnic minorities “knew their place,” and immigrants were only welcome when they were willing to be basically underpaid “slaves” of the white supremacist majority. (Think back on biblical Israel—they were at their WORST with God when THEY thought they were “great.” In God’s world, it’s humility that counts for something.)

 

In this text about Abram and God’s plan for him, it is clear that there is a “road” to greatness. So I guess it IS a journey, after all, friends! Mature Christians understand this, and also know it is both a struggle AND a joy to follow the peripatetic Jesus on HIS journey to make us all “great” by leading us to be SERVANTS of all. Again, humility counts for something with him. Those who want the best seat at the banquet must first be the servant of all. Great nations understand this. Respect is earned, and then maintained, by being the most caring, the most “neighborly,” and the most welcoming of the downtrodden and oppressed. Emma Lazarus had it right. Great nations say “Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free.” Christ is God’s “lamp” lifted to light all of our paths toward the “golden door” of freedom, acceptance, compassion, and respect. Great nations have these as their stock in trade. Being Christian doesn’t make a nation “great,” but when its citizens LIVE and ACT in accordance to religious teachings that emphasize citizenship, neighborliness, compassion, and benevolence over an “I’ve got more than YOU do” mentality, it is on the right track. They have engaged the journey, and it is one that will unfold in stages. Just ask Abram. Amen.

The Nature of God Counts for Something

 

The Nature of God Counts for Something

 

1 Samuel 2:1-10

My heart exults 

 

2:1 Hannah prayed and said, "My heart exults in the LORD; my strength is exalted in my God. My mouth derides my enemies because I rejoice in your victory.

 

2:2 There is no Holy One like the LORD, no one besides you; there is no Rock like our God.

 

2:3 Talk no more so very proudly; let not arrogance come from your mouth, for the LORD is a God of knowledge, and by him actions are weighed.

 

2:4 The bows of the mighty are broken, but the feeble gird on strength.

 

2:5 Those who were full have hired themselves out for bread, but those who were hungry are fat with spoil. The barren has borne seven, but she who has many children is forlorn.

 

2:6 The LORD kills and brings to life; he brings down to Sheol and raises up.

 

2:7 The LORD makes poor and makes rich; he brings low; he also exalts.

 

2:8 He raises up the poor from the dust; he lifts the needy from the ash heap to make them sit with princes and inherit a seat of honor. For the pillars of the earth are the Lord's, and on them he has set the world.

 

2:9 He will guard the feet of his faithful ones, but the wicked will perish in darkness, for not by might does one prevail.

 

2:10 The LORD! His adversaries will be shattered; the Most High will thunder in heaven. The LORD will judge the ends of the earth; he will give strength to his king and exalt the power of his anointed."

 

In 1992, I was appointed as an associate pastor to St. Paul’s United Methodist Church in Allison Park, PA. That church was also getting a new lead pastor (or “senior pastor,” as we called them back in the day), the Rev. Dr. Ronald Hoellein. Having served as a solo pastor (what is now called “senior pastor,” interestingly, by the appointment cabinet) for seven years, I knew this would mean an adjustment, on my part. The “good news” was that Ron Hoellein turned out to be the best pastor I have ever personally witnessed, and serving as one of his subordinates (a term HE would never use, by the way) was a great joy. As “associate” pastor, I joined a full-time Director of Christian Education, who was herself finishing seminary and planning for ordination as an Elder, and a retired former district superintendent, who served as our “minister of visitation.” And while my portfolio as associate pastor included a very vital and active youth ministry, Dr. Hoellein rather quickly discovered my administrative skills, and used these gifts to help “reorganize” St. Paul’s considerable “stable” of ministries, which numbered over 121, at that time. And that didn’t count the North Hills Community Outreach Center, which St. Paul’s had been integral in founding in the mid-1980s. It operated out of a building on our campus, and was growing rapidly, eventually eclipsing the operating budget of St. Paul’s! 

 

I offer this background so you can understand how important my five years of working with Ron Hoellein was to forming my ministry, going forward, after my tenure at St. Paul’s ended, at least at that time. I learned much from Ron’s wisdom, but I’m not sure any specific thing was more pronounced than what I learned from his astute and well-honed understanding of human psychology. It was the basis not only of his counseling ministry, but was woven into his interpretation of scripture and his preaching. As one who loved to “teach” the Bible in my own preaching, I came to see how important it was to “make the connection” with my listeners at levels they could truly grasp, especially when it came to feelings, personal needs, and “affectiveness.” And this is where we make the leap to what may be the most important thing I learned from Dr. Hoellein: How do we understand the NATURE of God?

 

I know I’ve brought this topic up numerous times before in these “retirement” sermons, but I guess its importance is so paramount that it just keeps “rearing its head,” as I peruse the lectionary in preparation for writing these weekly sermons. How DO you—YOU—understand the nature of God? Is your view of God that “he” is “the man upstairs”? Or is God the high, holy “judge” who is watching us, and will mete out rewards and punishments based on how we behave? Or, do we believe God IS love? And if so, what does this mean? While we who like to think “theologically” typically rebuff the temptation to “write ourselves on the heavens and then call it God,” it may be redeeming to have a view of a benevolent God who prefers to “rescue the perishing” rather than sink their boat and call it “justice.” How we “see” God may truly define how we act in the PRESENCE of God, and it most certainly may define how we treat OTHERS on this journey.

 

Ron Hoellein always said that our view of the nature of God set the tone for how we related to God, to OTHERS, and even to ourselves. Believing he is correct in this psychological/theological assessment, this brought a whole new perspective into my personal spiritual journey. I took time—still do—to assess this within myself. What IS it I believe about God, and how do I reconcile the scriptures and my own history to it? This concept certainly breathed new life into Outler’s famous “Wesleyan Quadrilateral” for me! Scripture, Tradition, Experience, and Reason are the tools for this personal process of reconciliation, guiding our insights about God, me, and yinz all. It married quite well with Buber’s famous “I-Thou” analysis. 

 

All of this is why this week’s passage from I Samuel chapter 2 tripped my trigger. In this passage, Hannah, the mother of the prophet Samuel,” is giving her famous (and quite prophetic) speech, praising God and setting forth the broad field that will be plowed by her beloved offspring. Her view of the nature of God is profoundly progressive, well ahead of its time, and accurate of the view of God one should receive from a learned and careful view of, you guessed it, Scripture, Tradition, Experience, and Reason! Her speech is perhaps once of the most profound narratives one may find in the Hebrew Bible, and it comes from a woman, which should make some of these testosterone-laden, modern “evangelicals” quake in their cowboy boots. Hannah largely succeeds in laying out a biblical view of the nature of God Almighty. Let’s look at it.

 

Hannah had been upstaged by her husband’s other wife, Peninnah, because she was apparently extremely fertile, while up to this point, Hannah had been barren. Now that Hannah had “miraculously” borne Samuel, she had to tell God what she thought of the Divine, and be thankful for her “deliverance,” to the glory of God. So, part one of her view of God’s nature was that God is a delivering God. She is quite exuberant in her praise of God for offering her God’s favor.

 

God is a God who exalts the humble, lifts the downtrodden, and boosts the poor, while also knocking the “high and mighty” down a few pegs. Human history has clearly shown that when humans are “winning,” we tend to too quickly sing our own praises and give “the big I” praise for all that we have accomplished. Not only do we naturally tend to push God to the side, but we also may use our newly acquired “throne” to cast aspersions on others who now are “less” than we have made ourselves to be. God is the opposite of this, and God tends to not abide humans when they “queue” in this manner. It is truth that one of the saddest realities of human practice is that when an oppressed group finally gets a few rungs up the ladder of deliverance, they “queue” themselves ahead of the next lower oppressed group. As Whites have oppressed Blacks in America, for example, so once Blacks began to make a few gains, they have sometimes turned their ire toward Hispanics. Again, God in Hannah’s speech is a God who doesn’t abide this “queuing” behavior.  

 

The commentators flag the highlighting of “sovereignty of God” issues in Hannah’s speech. Given that I attended a seminary that was organized around the Reformed tradition, God’s sovereignty was foundational to this understanding. The question is: Is there ANYTHING that is not in the purview and “power domain” of the Almighty? The Reformed and typically orthodox answer to this question is a resounding “NO.” As a Wesleyan Christian, I’m guessing John Wesley didn’t spend much time debating or defending God’s sovereignty for one simple reason: If one posits a “God” who created the universe INCLUDING humanity, why even question that such a god is all powerful and master of all domains? If we choose to believe in Yahweh, then we accept this as a given. The Wesleyan question becomes: How then shall we live? And the issue here, at least for Mr. Wesley, was going about the requisite moral/ethical life driven not by “fear” of a vengeful God, but motivated by gratitude for the love and grace extended to the creation by a benevolent God. This “difference” is key to how we perceive the nature of God, isn’t it? If I do something nice for my neighbor out of fear for being punished if I don’t, as opposed to doing it out of love of my neighbor, and out of wanted to glorify God though a benevolent act that “mirrors” God’s own love of me, is this Christian behavior? (I suppose one could argue the point that loving others because God first loved me might be seen as just a variation on the “fear” theme. Is there a higher genuineness in loving others just because they are my neighbors and fellow siblings on the path of life?) Here’s another thought that I personally believe trumps the “sovereignty” question: God created us in God’s “image,” which is a God of love, forgiveness, mercy, and compassion; these are, therefore, the natural “engrams” upon which my being is erected, and it is “natural” to live with them as my personal “core process.” 

 

Scholars point out the “prophetic foreshadowing” in Hannah’s speech. Is it also in our understanding of God’s nature that this “prophetic” manifestation of God’s action among humans is designed to guide our steps, warn us of impending hazards and pitfalls, and keep us both safe and heading toward the “abundant” life Jesus talked of? This view diverges from a more common one of the Hebrew Bible’s prophetic “ministry” being more warning Israel that bad days are coming because they have again screwed up. Hannah’s speech, in my opinion, bolsters the former view of prophecy, and has many have pointed out, seems directly related to the speech we have come to know as the “Magnificat of Mary” in the New Testament. So, God’s “ultimate” nature hasn’t changed between these two prophetic speeches? Who knew? Oh, and it’s important to point out that the two speakers, who seem to so clearly hone in on the actual nature of the divine are WOMEN.

 

All this to say, dear ones, that our view of the nature of God should COUNT FOR SOMETHING! And that “something” has to do with how we understand our relationship TO God, to God’s creation, and to our human siblings, worldwide and next door. But possibly just as importantly, it has to do with how we see ourselves and how we govern ourselves in the affairs of life. Hannah’s speech reminds us that the poor will be exalted, the righteous will reap the benefits of a blessed life, and those who mete out evil will be judged and will likewise “reap” what they have sown. God’s grace is available to all, but the “power” to reject all such benevolences is still granted to the people God has created. Our “free will” gift may be used for good OR for evil, and may even be squandered by us in our most foolish moments. We have within us the seeds of God’s own nature—a God who “wishes that none should perish.” The Incarnation of Jesus Christ is the most perfect reflection of God’s desire to be in a loving relationship with the created. We seem to be doing an adequate job of squandering that, too. On the downside, I would say that the church has more to fear from this, than from the proverbial “gates of Hell.” On the upside, we have been given the power to bring fulfillment to the prophetic speeches of these two great women of the Bible: Hannah and Mary, the mother of Jesus. God’s “nature” certainly counted for something for each of them. Do thou likewise, Beloved. Amen.